Melbourne car rampage: James Gargasoulas jailed for six murders

James Gargasoulas drove his car into pedestrians in Melbourne in 2017

An Australian man has been sentenced to life in jail for murdering six people and injuring 27 more in a vehicle attack in Melbourne.

James Gargasoulas, 29, deliberately ploughed a stolen car into pedestrians in the city centre in January 2017.

He later told a court in a confusing speech that he had carried out the attack after receiving a premonition.

On Friday, a judge described it as one of the worst mass murders in Australian history.

“You made no attempt to avoid people or to slow down. You simply ploughed through them, quite deliberately,” Justice Mark Weinberg said, according to a report by Seven News.

The attack killed three-month-old Zachary Bryant, Thalia Hakin, 10, Jess Mudie, 22, Yosuke Kanno, 25, Bhavita Patel, 33, and Matthew Si, 33.

Gargasoulas will be eligible for parole after 46 years.

He had pleaded not guilty to the attack, but later admitted to carrying it out.

A jury took less than an hour to convict him last year, after what prosecutors called “the clearest case of criminal liability that you will ever come across”.