Trent Evans, 45, was sentenced to seven years and 10 months in prison at the Victorian County Court on Thursday morning for drunkenly crashing a car in Melbourne’s east in April last year, killing passenger and friend Rex Willox, 44, immediately.Evans, an award-winning reporter who “excelled” academically and professionally, was unshaven, overweight and nearly unrecognisable as he watched Judge John Lyon hand down his sentence from a prison video link.The “very grave offence,” in the words of Mr Lyon, began when Evans arrived at Mr Willox’s Toorak home, where the pair began to drink multiple bottles of champagne. A decision was made by the pair to drive to the north of Melbourne, where Evans was then living, in Mr Willox’s black Mercedes sedan.Evans, who told police he was the “more sober of the two,” was driving at 112 km/h on Barkley St, Burnley, at more than double the legal limit when he failed to navigate a bend in the road.The car struck a bollard, flipped, and killed Mr Willox immediately, while Evans spent three days in The Alfred Hospital.The crash came during a tumultuous period in Evans’ life.He worked at Channel 7’s Melbourne and rural Queensland news rooms after starting out as a teenager, where he was awarded dux of his year 11 class and started out his professional life with a sought-after cadetship with News Corp’s Leader newspapers.But in 2016 the court heard that Evans succumbed to the pressures of his job and checked himself into a country hospital, in what Mr Lyons described as a “mental health crisis” that for a short time left him unable to speak.His life never got back on track, and in 2018 Evans began to experience what Mr Lyon described as “the vicissitudes of life on the street,” relying on Anglicare support for meals, showers and other essentials. In 2018 and 2019 Evans was routinely assaulted, and more than once was hospitalised. Despite having three previous drink-driving convictions from the mid-2000s the day of the accident was the first drink Evans had consumed since 2017, when he stopped drinking after contracting hepatitis A. The court heard that Mr Willox’s sister had considered making a victim impact statement to the court, but would “struggle to express” the extent of her grief.Judge Lyon said it was “an eloquent response to the loss she feels due to your criminal conduct.”Evans, who has been in prison since earlier this month, will be eligible for parole after five years and two months.
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