Director of Public Prosecutions v Conley

[2025] VCC 427

IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA

AT MELBOURNE

CRIMINAL DIVISION

Revised
Not Restricted
Suitable for Publication

Case No. CR-24-01358

DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS

V

HANNAH CONLEY

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JUDGE:	HER HONOUR JUDGE BRECKWEG
WHERE HELD:	Melbourne
DATE OF HEARING:	5 February 2025
DATE OF SENTENCE:	26 February 2025
CASE MAY BE CITED AS:	DPP v Conley
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION:	[2025] VCC 427

REASONS FOR SENTENCE
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Subject:CRIMINAL LAW - SENTENCING

Catchwords:              Blackmail – 1 charge; youthful offender; drug use; non-conviction disposition.

Legislation Cited:      Crimes Act1958 (Vic); Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic).

Cases Cited:R v Boland [2007] VSCA 242; Rootsey v R [2018] VSCA 108; Bugmy v R [2013] HCA 37

Sentence:                  3 years Community Correction Order without conviction; 200 hours of community work; mental health treatment; drug abuse treatment; judicial monitoring; forfeiture order.

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APPEARANCES:	Counsel	Solicitors
For the DPP	Ms G. Hogg	Solicitor for the Office of Public Prosecutions
For the Accused	Ms H. Sycamore	Victoria Legal Aid

HER HONOUR:

1Hannah Conley, you have pleaded guilty to one charge of blackmail. The offence carries a maximum penalty of 15 years imprisonment which represents Parliament’s view of the seriousness of the offence. The facts of your offending are set out in the Summary of Prosecution Opening (Exhibit A on the plea), and these were not in dispute.

2On 7 or 8 August 2019, you sent a message to the male victim on an on-line application named ‘Hot Hook Ups’ using the name ‘Natalie’. You asked the victim how he was and gave him your phone number. On 9 August 2019, you started speaking with the victim via text message and you asked him what you would need to do to earn $1,500 and the victim responded that you would need to sleep with him for 2 weeks, which you agreed to do.

3You and the victim discussed meeting up and you sent him photographs which he believed, incorrectly, were images of you. During your conversation, you asked to be paid the $1,500 up front but the victim stated that he would transfer $300 to your bank account to cover your first meeting and thereafter he would transfer money to you every day until the agreement ended. Ultimately you and the victim negotiated an initial payment to you of $350.

4On 10 August, $300 was transferred to your bank account by the victim. When you saw that the victim had transferred only $300 to you and not $350, you demanded a further $700 upfront from the victim which he refused to pay. In response to this, you sent the victim a screen shot of his Facebook page along with a screen shot of the Facebook page of a woman and asked the victim ‘Is this your girlfriend?’ You then demanded payment of $1,500 and threatened the victim that if you choose not to go by the right thing, she will be informed about everything you are doing.

5You continued to threaten the victim by telling him that if he did not pay you the $1500 you would contact his girlfriend and give her photographs and copies of your conversations. The victim told you that you could keep the $300 he had already paid you, but you continued to press for the full $1500 telling the victim he had until 5pm to pay and that it would be ‘the worst mistake you’ll ever make with me’ if he attempted to call your bluff.

6The victim then sent you what he purported was a receipt for payment of $700 to you and you responded ‘How stupid do you think I am…I want $1500 in my bank account in the 10 minutes, or your fucking girlfriend will know about everything your fucking doing behind her back (sic). Heck I might as well just tell her now. She deserves to know the truth’.

7You then sent the victim a draft of a message you proposed to send to the woman attaching the conversations between you and the victim and including the words ‘I’m not the only one he’s tried to have sex with for money’. Ultimately, the victim sent you a message telling you ‘Don’t text me, don’t call me…Take care go find someone and use him and take his money’. You responded by sending the victim screenshots of the Facebook profiles of his family and friends and threatening to tell them what he was doing. The victim then blocked you and no further contact occurred between you both.

8In your record of interview with police on 10 May 2020 you stated that you had never been involved in anything to do with asking for money to sleep with someone and ‘Of course it’s going to look like I’ve done it. But I’m telling you now when I say that I didn’t do this’. Police subsequently found the photos of ‘Natalie’ you had sent the victim on your mobile phone and confirmed from your bank records that the initial payment of $300 from the victim was received in your account.

Sentencing Principles

9In sentencing you, I have had regard to the purposes for which a court may impose sentence set out in s 5 of the Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic) and to the matters outlined in s 5(2), which include the maximum penalty for the offence, the nature and gravity of the offence, the offender’s culpability and degree of responsibility for the offence, the impact of the offending on any victim, an offender’s prior character and the presence of any aggravating or mitigating factors or other relevant circumstances.

Personal circumstances and matters in mitigation

10Your personal background was set out comprehensively by your Counsel in her written and oral submissions on your behalf.

11You were born in May 1999, and you were aged 20 at the time of the offending. You are now, at the date of sentence, 25 years old. Whilst you are not a young offender and you were not a child when you committed the offence, I nevertheless give weight to the fact that when you offended you were only 20 and a person of immature years, you have not reoffended since the initial offending and have, for the first time, been drug free since September 2024.

12As held in R v Boland[1] although you fall to be sentenced as an adult, ‘common sense and fairness’ dictate that an assessment of the nature and gravity of the crime and your level of moral culpability should take into account ‘…that what was done was done as a child, or a person of immature years, and not as an adult or a person of greater maturity’.

[1] [2007] VSCA 242 at [16].

13For this reason, I moderate the weight to be given to general deterrence in your case.[2]

[2] Rootsey v R [2018] VSCA 108 at [14].

14You experienced trauma growing up as you were exposed to your mother’s problematic alcohol usage, which led to conflict and instability in the family home, and you being the subject of verbal abuse. You reported that these experiences made you feel ‘unwanted’. You also reported that you were sexually abused by a neighbour as a child which was never disclosed and accordingly you received no psychological counselling or support in relation to this. I am satisfied that these experiences engage Bugmy[3] principles in a general sense and your moral culpability for the offending is accordingly reduced.

[3] [2013] HCA 37

15You attended school until year 9 when you disengaged due to difficulties in relation to your untreated mental health conditions and you commenced using alcohol and drugs at around this time. You left the family home at age 19 and at this point your drug use escalated, and not long afterwards you commenced offending. Since your offending, you were also in a relationship in which you were subjected to considerable family violence. That relationship has now ended but I still have regard generally to the violence you endured in that relationship.

16You were hospitalised on 24 September 2024 following a suicide attempt and since your discharge from hospital you have ceased using drugs entirely, have sought mental health treatment and moved back to the family home to live with your mother, father and elder sister with whom you enjoy a close relationship.

17I have had regard to your previous character and although you have no recorded convictions, you did admit guilt in 2018 in relation to charges of theft and attempting to commit an indictable offence. You were placed on a Diversion Plan in respect of those offences, and you complied with that plan and the charges were ultimately dismissed. I was informed that you also committed drug possession offences in 2019 (for which you were placed on a without conviction adjourned undertaking which was successfully completed) and in 2023 at which time you were also placed on a without conviction adjourned undertaking for 18 months. You are still subject to that undertaking which expires on 16 June 2026.  You have no pending matters.

18You pleaded guilty to the charge at the first available opportunity, being at the first committal mention of the matter. Your plea warrants a clear reduction in sentence to reflect its utilitarian value in saving the community the time and expense of a trial and witnesses from having to give evidence, and its demonstration of acceptance of responsibility.

19I also give weight to the considerable delay in this matter being finalised. You were charged with the offence on 6 November 2020 but the filing hearing or first listing of the matter did not occur until 19 June 2024. I was told this delay was to allow police to continue further investigations involving auditing your telephone, but no further charges were ultimately laid. I accept that you were required to wait a considerably long period until your case finally reached court and the uncertainty of what would occur would have been ‘hanging over your head’ and weighing heavily on you.

20Your counsel accepted that your illicit drug use played a very large part in your offending as you were desperate for money to fund your addiction. You yourself told the psychologist Dr Campbell, and the officer who assessed your suitability for a Community Correction Order that your primary motivation for the offending was to obtain money to purchase drugs, and you were not considering the consequences of your actions at the time. You were also associating with peers who were engaged in similar behaviour at the time of your offending.

21In terms of your mental health, Dr Campbell opined in his report dated 26 January 2025 (Exhibit 1 on the Plea) that you have diagnoses of Borderline Personality Disorder, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (“PTSD”), ADHD and Substance Use Disorder. The Mental Health Advice and Response Service (“MHARS”) report similarly noted your well documented history of Borderline Personality Disorder, PTSD, ADHD, Depression and poly substance misuse.

22Mr Campbell opined that your underlying mental health issues “likely” contributed to your offending because of the impacts your mental illnesses had on your consequential thinking and problem solving.  Mr Campbell stated that in his opinion, your offending ‘…appears to be a maladaptive attempt to have [your] immediate perceived needs met, which was the ongoing use of illicit substances to cope with life during a period of instability and distress’.

23It is often difficult to disentangle the interrelationship between mental health issues and drug misuse. In your case, I am satisfied – and the prosecution accepted – that your offending did not occur solely due to your drug use at the time of the offending, which would not be mitigating, but when you also had untreated mental illnesses and your ability to think consequentially was impaired. For this reason, I consider Verdins limbs 2 and 3 apply, and I take your mental health issues into account in determining the appropriate sentencing disposition and I moderate the weight to be given to general deterrence in your case.

24Again, I have moderated your level of moral culpability for the offending in the general sense espoused in Bugmy. I also accept the applicability of limbs 5 and 6 of Verdins in that imprisonment would be more onerous for you than for a person without your mental health difficulties and there is a risk that your mental health would be likely to deteriorate were you to be imprisoned.

25I now turn to your risk of reoffending and your prospects of rehabilitation. Clearly, your drug and mental health conditions have not been well managed at all in the past. Mr Campbell opined that without treatment or psychiatric intervention for your mental health difficulties you are at risk of relapsing to drug use in response to stress, relationship instability or because of your unresolved past trauma. If you did relapse into drug use, you present a risk of offending for the purpose of obtaining money to fund your drug addiction.

26The author of the community correction order assessment outcome report assessed you as being a higher risk of general re-offending presumably because of the risk that a relapse into drug use would lead to reoffending to obtain money to fund your habit given the need to obtain drugs was the key motivator for – and pre-cursor to – your current offending.

27For this reason, it was recommended that if a community correction order was imposed, a drug treatment condition be attached along with a mental health treatment condition. The report from MAHRS similarly noted that you would benefit from ongoing mental health treatment, and this should be a condition of any community correction order to promote your well-being and reduce the likelihood of reoffending.

28In terms of your prospects of rehabilitation, you have not used drugs, I am told, since your release from hospital on 25 September 2024, where you had been involuntarily detained for 2 days following a suicide attempt. Whilst in hospital, you connected with a clinical psychologist who you continue to consult and commenced the process of working on your mental health. Your cessation from drug use following your release from hospital is the first time you have been entirely drug free.

29You told Mr Campbell that you felt ashamed of your offending, and you acknowledged the influence of your drug use and need to obtain money to purchase drugs along with your association with a person at the time of your offending who was engaging in similar offending as the motivators for your offending. You expressed an intention to continue not to use drugs to avoid future offending. When you were interviewed for your MAHRS assessment, you also identified the importance of not taking drugs and prioritising your mental health as pivotal to ensuring you do not reoffend.

30I accept that you now have considerable insight into the reason for your offending and that you are committed to not reoffending. You have, for the first time in your life, been drug free for some months. You now fully realise that drug abuse and negative peers were instrumental in your offending, and you wish to engage in further drug and mental health treatment to prevent reoffending. You have no outstanding or pending criminal matters. Your offending after the present offending was of low seriousness and of a different nature to the present offence. You have the support of your family, with whom you now reside.

31On balance I find that you have very good prospects of rehabilitation if you abstain from drug use, disassociate from negative peers and engage in mental health and drug treatment.

32Ultimately your counsel submitted that you should be placed on a Community Correction Order without conviction. The prosecution agreed that a Community Correction Order was an appropriate disposition that reflected the gravity of your offending whilst also giving due weight to the matters relied on in mitigation.

33I am satisfied that a sentence of imprisonment is not required in your case and that a Community Correction Order, with appropriate conditions, is a sentencing disposition that provides a measure of general and specific deterrence and represents a balance of both punitive and therapeutic or rehabilitative sentencing objectives. I have received a Community Correction Order assessment, and you have been found suitable to be placed on such an order. Do you consent to the making of a Community Correction Order?

34OFFENDER:    Yes, I do.

35The central question that remains is whether the CCO should carry a conviction. Your counsel urged me not to record a conviction whilst the prosecution submitted a conviction was necessary. The issue of whether to record a conviction in your case is very finely balanced. I have had regard to the matters in s 8(1) of the Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic), as I am required to do. In terms of the nature of the offence, again, blackmail is a serious offence, and your counsel accepted that your offending was at a medium level of seriousness. Notably however, your offending occurred over a short period of time, it did not involve threats to kill or cause serious physical harm, and you did not ultimately carry out your threats.

36You also present with significant mitigating factors. Your offending occurred when you were under the influence of drugs and suffering symptoms of borderline personality disorder which affected your consequential thinking. You were only 20 when the offence was committed and you are, at the time of sentencing, still a young woman at 25. You had a childhood that was traumatic, you were diagnosed with several serious mental health issues at a young age, and I accept that you are committed not to reoffend. I also accept that given your age, rehabilitation plays an important role.

37You have no prior convictions and the findings of guilt that have been made against you were for minor offences committed when you were still using drugs. You are now drug free and are committed to undergoing mental health and drug treatment and to moving on and living a productive life.

38in terms of the consequences of having a conviction recorded, it is somewhat speculative as to whether a conviction would harm your future employment prospects as it has become increasingly common for future employers not to ask ‘do you have any prior convictions’ but instead to ask ‘have you ever been charged with an offence’ or ‘have there been any findings of guilt made against you in criminal proceedings’. I do accept that there is certainly a risk that a conviction for an offence of this nature would jeopardise your future employment prospects. I also consider it may harm your social and economic well-being in circumstances where you have now enrolled in a diploma of community services, and you are earnestly trying to set your life back on course in circumstances where you have mental health issues of an enduring nature.

39However, it must be kept in mind that blackmail is an inherently serious offence with general deterrence being a sentencing factor of great importance, as was accepted by your counsel. In your case, you made several demands for money from the victim and made repeated threats to expose his willingness to have sexual relations with you for money to his girlfriend and family and friends.

40Whilst your offending occurred over a short period of time there were persistent demands and threats made during this period. Your offending involved a degree of planning in that you obtained, and then used, a false photograph and purported to the victim that this was you and your motivation for the offending was to obtain money to fund your serious drug addiction.

41After carefully weighing up the competing arguments, I have decided not to impose a conviction. You were very young when you committed the offences and are now only 25. You are now drug free, have the support of your family and are committed to maintaining your drug abstinence and undertaking mental health treatment. You have enrolled in a course and want to build a new life, and I consider it appropriate to give you the opportunity to do so without the potential obstacle a conviction may present to your employment prospects, your mental health and your efforts to remain drug free.

Sentence

42Ms Conley, please be upstanding:

43In relation to charge one, you are, without conviction, placed on a Community Correction Order for three years.

44The mandatory terms and standard conditions apply. In addition, I impose the following special conditions:

45You are to perform 200 hours of unpaid community work over two years. You are to perform 200 hours of unpaid community work over two years.

46You are required to undergo assessment and treatment, including testing, for drug abuse or dependency.

47You are required to undergo mental health assessment and treatment.

48I order that all hours of treatment and rehabilitation satisfactorily undertaken are to be counted as hours of unpaid community work for the purposes of the unpaid community work condition.

49You are required to be supervised, monitored and managed as directed by the Secretary to the Department of Justice or his or her nominee.

50I also impose a judicial monitoring condition. I would like to check in with you and see how you are going in three months’ time on 26 May 2025 at 9.30am. I will, at that time, order a further review, but we will see how you are going before I decide how long I should wait until I check in with you again.

51Pursuant to s 6AAA of the Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic), the sentence I would have imposed but for your plea of guilty is three months imprisonment.

52I make the forfeiture order for the Apple iPhone, as sought by the prosecution.

53HER HONOUR:     Okay. Thank you both very much for your assistance. I am grateful. Yes, we will adjourn.