Director of Public Prosecutions v Dukic
[2023] VCC 799
•3 Feb 2023
| IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA | Revised Not Restricted Suitable for Publication |
AT MELBOURNE
CRIMINAL JURISDICTION
CR-22-01866
| DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS |
| v |
| DEJAN DUKIC |
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JUDGE: | HER HONOUR JUDGE GAYNOR |
WHERE HELD: | Melbourne |
DATE OF HEARING: | |
DATE OF SENTENCE: | 3 Feb 2023 |
CASE MAY BE CITED AS: | DPP v Dukic |
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION: | [2023] VCC 799 |
REASONS FOR SENTENCE
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APPEARANCES: | Counsel | Solicitors |
| For the Director of Public Prosecutions | Mr A. Grant | |
For the Accused | Ms M. Milides |
HER HONOUR:
1Dejan Dukic, you have pleaded guilty before me to one charge of possessing an explosive device or unlawful object; one charge of trafficking in a commercial quantity of a drug of dependence namely ephedrine;
three charges of trafficking in a drug of dependence; two charges of possessing a drug of dependence and one charge of unauthorised possession of a trafficable quantity of firearms.2You have also pleaded guilty to the following summary offences which are uplifted pursuant to ss145 and 242 of the Criminal Procedure Act. They are possessing cartridge ammunition without a licence, dealing with property suspected of being the proceeds of crime, namely $112,950 and a
Victoria Police Motorola radio, and possessing a prohibited weapon without exemption, namely a double-edged hunting knife, a butterfly knife, nunchucks, knuckleduster and ballistic vests/body armour. Those three summary offences related to a police raid conducted at your home on 31 October 2017.3You also pleaded guilty to the summary charges of dealing with property suspected of being the proceeds of crime, namely $2,735 cash and committing an indictable offence on bail. Those two summary offences related to the police raid conducted on your home on 9 September 2019.
4The facts underlying your offending are as follows. I annex the extremely detailed prosecution opening to the sentencing remarks, but in brief compass the offending alleged against you was revealed as a result of the two police raids that I have referred to. They both took place at your family home at
in Vineeta Drive, Cranbourne North where you lived with your mother,
Vera Dukic and younger brother Alexander.5On the morning of 31 October 2017, police from the Dandenong Divisional Response Unit executed search warrants at your home at which time you were unemployed, in receipt of Centrelink benefits and were a prohibited person as defined in s3(2)(a) of the Firearms Act 1996, but as you have been convicted of criminal offences and were sentenced to a 12-month Community Corrections Order in March of that year which was on foot at the time of that raid.
6Police were accompanied by investigators from the Clandestine Laboratory Squad and the Critical Incident Response Team. They seized a large number of items from both the house and the garage including the prohibited weapons underlying a Summary Charge 11. In a void behind cupboards in the kitchen area police located a Tommy Hilfiger zip bag containing $112,950. Possession of this money underlies the Summary 8 Charge dealing with the proceeds of - a property suspected of being the proceeds of crime. Police also found that the Motorola MMR police issue radio, which also formed part of Summary Charge 8 and which had initially been assigned to a particular police station.
7Police searching the garage examined a shelving unit behind a table which was attached to a wooden structure. First Constable Luke Mason removed an unpainted screw from the structure and found there was a void behind it. In it was stored three plastic bags containing a white crystal substance, one silver handgun with a loaded magazine containing four rounds of .22 ammunition. A second silver coloured handgun with a black handle along with a loaded magazine containing six rounds of unknown calibre ammunition. A third silver handgun but this time with a brown handle, along with a loaded magazine containing two rounds of an unknown calibre ammunition. And a further silver coloured handgun with a brown handle wrapped in a white cloth.
8Police also discovered a plastic bag containing a white powdered substance, a box containing 20 rounds of .22 calibre ammunition, various vials and other plastic pressed sealed bag containing white tablets, powdered substances, yellow substances, and finally a vacuum sealed plastic bag containing
two explosive sticks, a detonator and detonators.9Charge 1 on the indictment, possessing an explosive device without a lawful excuse relates to your possession of that last item which was on analysis found to comprise two Senatel Magnum explosive sticks along with a detonator cord and explosive detonators.
10Three bags taken from the void contained white powder which was analysed as comprising 370 grams of pure ephedrine. The commercial quantity of ephedrine as defined by the Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Act is 100 grams and the trafficable quantity of ephedrine is 20 grams.
11Charge 3, trafficking in methylamphetamine. Related to the total quantity of methylamphetamine, located in various substances and places which were seized during the search of both the house and the garage, which was approximately 68 grams. The trafficable quantity of methylamphetamine is
3 grams.12Charge 4, relates to other drugs located in the house and in the garage. The comprised cocaine, MDMA, diazepam, alprazolam, or Xanax, methandienone ethyloestenol, testosterone, heroin and amphetamine. Possessing of each of them comprised an offence pursuant to s73(1) of the Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Act, are included in the one count which therefore comprises a rolled-up charge.
13Charge 5, relates to the firearms located in the void, none of which was registered. Three of the firearms were single-action semi-automatic pistols. The final was a homemade derringer and was an under and over breakover pistol. Pursuant to s7C(1) of the Firearms Act, possession of this quantity of unregistered firearms amounts to possession of a trafficable quantity of firearms. At the time you were also a prohibited person insofar as firearms is concerned, as I have outlined.
14Following your arrest, you conducted a no comment record of interview. You were remanded in custody but then bailed on 1 February 2018, subject to conditions and your participation in a Court Integrated Services program. You were still on bail when police again executed a search warrant at your home on Monday, 9 September 2019. Police on that occasion also searched your motor vehicle. They located Australian currency worth about $2,735 in your bedroom and the garage, possession of which underlies the related summary charge of dealing with property suspected of being the proceeds of crime.
15Also, in the garage police found a water bottle containing a cloudy liquid later analysed as containing 1,4 butanediol, possession of which underlies the Charge 8 on the indictment, possession of GHB. In a concealed compartment under a coffee table in the garage on which in fact the GHB was located, police discovered a Ziplock bag containing white compressed powder later analysed as comprising cocaine in a trafficable quantity and this underlies Charge 7 on the indictment.
16The contents of a second Ziplock bag of white crystals which were later analysed were found to contain a trafficable quantity of amphetamine underlying Charge 6 on the indictment. Police had also that day served you with a firearms prohibition order.
17As I have stated, at the time of this raid you were on bail relating to the 2017 matters. And this fact underlies the summary offence of committing an indictable offence whilst on bail.
18The maximum penalties for possessing an explosive device without a lawful excuse is five years' imprisonment. The maximum penalty for trafficking in a commercial quantity of ephedrine is 25 years' imprisonment. This is a
category 2 offence and attracts a mandatory sentence of imprisonment in the absence of statutory exemptions. The maximum penalty for trafficking in methylamphetamine is 15 years' imprisonment. The maximum penalty for possessing cocaine, MDMA, diazepam, alprazolam, or Xanax, methandienone ethyloestenol, testosterone, heroin, amphetamine and cannabis is 15 years' imprisonment as a rolled-up charge.19The maximum penalty for possessing a trafficable quantity of unregistered firearms is 10 years. imprisonment. The maximum penalty for possessing cartridge ammunition without a licence is 40 penalty units. The maximum penalty for possessing a prohibited weapons is 240 penalty units or two years' imprisonment. The maximum penalty for trafficking in cocaine is 15 years' imprisonment. The maximum penalty for possessing GHB is 400 penalty units or five years' imprisonment. The maximum penalty for committing an indictable offence whilst on bail is 30 penalty units or three months' imprisonment.
20None of the charges are ones to which the standards in sentencing scheme applies. I have neglected the basis of the summary charge relating to the possession of the cartridge ammunition without a licence. This relates to the ammunition found in the void behind the wooden structure in the garage during the 2017 search.
21The history of this matter also bears some mention. You were remanded in custody on 31 October 2017 and bailed on 1 February 2018. Then on
22 August 2018 you were again remanded in custody in relation to unrelated charges which were subsequently withdrawn on 16 January 2019. You were bailed on those charges in the Supreme Court on 2 November 2018, therefore you were on bail as I have said when you committed the offences on
9 September 2019. You were released on bail following a police interview where again exercised your right to remain silent on 9 September 2019, but remanded again on 20 November 2019 and ultimately your bail was revoked. You have remained in custody ever since.22Further on 20 November 2017 you were sentenced to 30 days' imprisonment on an unrelated matter dealt with by the Frankston Magistrates' Court, which time was reckoned as served by the Magistrate although strictly speaking you were in custody in relation to the 2017 charges. They have therefore in a
way - that pre-sentence time has therefore in a way been taken from you.23Further you spent 133 days in custody on remand in relation to the matters for which you were arrested in August 2018, but which were ultimately withdrawn. You spent 133 days on remand for those charges and they should be reckoned as Renzella time. These are matters I have taken to account in determining the sentence I will impose upon you today.
24Directions hearings in relation to the matters of this court were conducted in June, July and August of 2020 and then in August of that year scientist,
George Siadis was cross-examined on a s198B hearing. On 6 November and 17 December 2020, I heard pre-trial argument as to whether the 2017 and 2019 charges should be heard together in the one trial on a tendency basis and essentially will favour of the prosecution on 2 March 2021. I was informed by both counsel that plea negotiations then began to take place.25Several directions hearings were conducted in May, June and July 2022, and on October 3 2021, I conducted a sentence indication hearing. The prosecutor Mr Grant conceded during this plea hearing that plea offers were made on your behalf Mr Dukic shortly after my pre-trial ruling of March 2021. And that the matter had resolved essentially to the same charge as heard before the court in this plea hearing with some minor amendments and withdrawals. However, a sticking point arose in relation to the $112,000 located in a bag in the kitchen of your home in 2017.
26There was concern on the part of the defence that the cash which was
found - that that cash which was found in a handbag in another bag also containing cash was derived partly from the sale of a business in 2016, so that some of those monies could not be designated as proceeds of crime. Ultimately, that matter was resolved and the plea hearing eventually listed.27It was submitted on your behalf Mr Dukic by Mr Dan KC that delay was a mitigating factor that I should take into account. I will refer to this later in the sentencing remarks. But this was a mater disputed to some extent by the prosecution in light of the progress - carriage and progress of this matter as I have outlined.
28Also, of relevance is the fact that at the sentence indication hearing I gave my view that a sentence in the region of a six-year maximum with a four-year minimum term would be an appropriate response to this offending. I was referred by Mr Dann to the decision of His Honour Mr Justice Kaye JA in a ruling in a restricted matter reported at [2022] VSC 73R, where His Honour at
paragraph 22 noted, that pursuant to ss207, 208 and 209 of the Criminal Procedure Act if a court gives a sentence indication pursuant to the provisions of s207 and an accused then pleads guilty to any charge to which the sentence indication relates at the first available opportunity, the sentencing court must not impose a more severe sentence than the maximum the total effective sentence indicated. Mr Dann therefore in my view correctly submitted that I should not proceed to sentence you to any greater term than that I indicated at the sentence indication hearing.29I now turn to your person circumstances.
30You are 34 years old, the middle of three boys, born to your parents who emigrated here from Serbia. You were raised in Dandenong and suffered a difficult and turbulent childhood. Your father was an extremely violent man, who assaulted you, your mother and older brother on a regular basis.
He himself being a heavy abuser of both drugs and alcohol which exacerbated that violence. You described to Psychologist, Dr Matthew Barth for his report dated 30 August 2022, was tendered on the plea, as a child being hit by your father with a closed fist leaving you bloody and bruised.31Your parents separated a number of different times, your mother fleeing his violence and seeking sanctuary in refuges. In particular on one occasion in South Australia where you and she fled, you were forced to return to Victoria as your older brother was still living with your father and you then lived in a refuge in Richmond for about three months. Your parents reconciled on the basis of your father's promised reformation, which needless to say did not occur, but in that time your youngest brother Alexander was born. Your parents separated permanently shortly after.
32You then had semi-regular contact with your father but he continued to abuse drugs and alcohol and was involved heavily in criminal activity serving terms of imprisonment. Indeed, he is currently serving a term of imprisonment at
Fulham Prison where you yourself are being held in custody. Your older brother is also serving a lengthy period of imprisonment for drug related offending. In any event, once your parents separated you were essentially supported by your mother who you told Dr Barth worked three jobs to support yourself and your brothers.33At primary school while not encountering any particular academic difficulties, you were subjected to intense bullying over several years which significantly affected your self-esteem. This ended when you fought back, and in your years at Hampton Park Secondary College you no longer suffered such problems. During that time your sporting prowess particularly in soccer became evident. You completed Year 12 and began a diploma in building, completing the first year. As you were an extremely talented soccer player who played in the National Football League and it was your hope to become a professional player. However, at age 17 or 18 while shooting a winning goal for your team, you tore your anterior crucial ligament which needed reconstruction.
34You returned to play but reinjured your knee suffering a post-surgery tear. More surgery was required, it was not successful, you suffered chronic reactive arthritis which continues to plague you to this day, and which still requires further surgery. These injuries effectively put an end to your sporting aspirations. You were then 19 years old. This was a great emotional blow to you and what also caused a dropout of your first year of tertiary study due to surgery and decided not to return when you were told you would have to repeat the first year in order to
re-enrol.35You then worked in semi-skilled jobs such as painting and tiling but your capacity to work was eventually undermined by a growing severe heavy substance abuse.
36You had tried to avoid drug use in your younger years after witnessing your father and older brother's issues but began using cannabis when you were 20, and in the aftermath of your second unsuccessful knee surgery, when it became clear you could no longer continue playing soccer.
37You told Dr Barth that both your father and older brother supplied you with cannabis and your dependence on it escalated until you were using it daily and you used cannabis daily at very high levels for about three years before developing a paranoid condition. You then reduced your use but substituted it with more stimulant related drugs in particular amphetamine and methamphetamine. Your abuse of those drugs escalated and eventually your social network comprised other drug users and those involved in criminal activity. Ultimately, you were using ice on a daily basis, regularly using with both your father and older brother and occasionally supplementing your drug use with binge drinking. You also used benzodiazepine to reduce the effects of methamphetamine so you could sleep.
38In those years you also developed a gambling problem. Eventually in 2013 your mother tried to come to your rescue by setting you up in a charcoal grill takeaway business, but this ultimately failed because your drinking and gambling problems continued and was sold in 2016.
39In 2015 you were placed on the disability support pension because your substance abuse issues and knee pain prevented you from working even in areas such as casual painting work. On the failure of the business your drug use increased even more and you began incurring heavy debts to your suppliers. Eventually, as I understand it, you repaid those debts by agreeing to allow your debtors to store both drugs and weapons at your mother's homes. These of course were eventually seized by police in the raid on
31 October 2017. I note the prosecution accepts that this factual background to the charges to be an acceptable one.40You do have some prior convictions for offending beginning in - sorry can I just repeat that last sentence which was actually grammatically incorrect I do apologise. I note the prosecution does not demur from this explanation given to the court by your counsel of the factual scenario underlying Charges 1 and 5 on the indictment, which relate to the October 2017 raid.
41You do have some prior convictions for offending beginning in 2014 when you were dealt with for cultivating cannabis, possessing amphetamines, possessing ecstasy and possessing cartridge ammunition without a licence for which you received a suspended sentence.
42In 2015 you were fined for possessing methylamphetamine and then again fined later that year for possessing amphetamine, cannabis and unnamed drug of dependence. In 2017, you were sentenced to one months' imprisonment and released on a Community Corrections Order on driving offences, possession of ice, resisting an emergency worker on duty and failing an oral fluid test.
43This offending in my view, is of far less seriousness than the offending which has brought you before the court and also indicative of your burgeoning drug difficulties at the time. As I have said you were eventually released on bail on 1 February 2018 on strict conditions including conditions that you participate in the Court Integrated Services Program. You did well during this time, fulfilling all program - all conditions and completing the CISP program by 31 May 2018 as attested to the CISP reports tendered by your counsel.
44Your progress was halted when you were arrested in August on the charges which are ultimately withdrawn. You were released on 2 November 2018, but your counsel inform me you then became extremely anxious about your looming trial in relation to the 2017 matters. You ultimately relapsed back into drug use. As your counsel put it, it all fell apart again and soon you were abusing ice heavily. Again, you became involved in a criminal activity with your suppliers and began trafficking, both to support your habit and to pay off your debt to those suppliers. It was in that context that you again began to store the cocaine and methylamphetamine at your home for the purposes of trafficking, which drugs were seized by police on 9 September 2019.
45As I have said you have remained in custody ever since and you have done well in custody. You are working as a billet in the gym and that is a position of trust. Importantly, despite COVID conditions resulting in you spending as your counsel informed me (and which I accept) more than 100 days in lockdown, due to emergency conditions surrounding the pandemic. Despite the limitation of programs available within the gaol, you have undertaken the six-hour Ice and Me Program as well as an impressive amount of prison education obtaining a certificate in the vocational pathways course, cleaning operation, kitchen operations and civil construction. You have remained drug free as evidenced by the results of random drug screens carried out particularly in 2022.
46In January 2022 you began attending upon a Gambler's Help therapeutic counsellor, Jacinta Crealy, from whom I received three reports. In her second report dated September 2022, she noted you had been attending on the counselling service for nine months. (Indistinct words) two sessions, one due to a time change making you unavailable and one due to lockdown. Ms Crealy noted:
'Dejan noted he prefers to keep busy. He has established a regular exercise regime and has jobs in the kitchen and doing maintenance. He recently started a new job cleaning the gym on Friday, Saturday and occasional Sundays.'
47In her final report dated 17 January 2023, Ms Crealy noted that you had continued to attend the counselling course despite it being unavailable during October and November 2022 due to further restrictions arising from a re-emergence of the pandemic.
48You have also enrolled in the Salvation Army positive lifestyle program, having completed seven out of the eight sessions, which are facilitated by the trained Salvation Army facilitator on a one-to-one basis and addressing issues such as self-awareness, depression and loneliness, grief and loss, anger and so forth. In his report dated 27 January 2023, Salvation Army Chaplain Brett Morris at Fulham Correctional Centre noted you had sought him out to engage in the program and that he was very impressed by your 'dedication, intention and desire to learn new skills from the program to enhance his life.'
49I received a number of impressive references from family and friends. You are in a relationship with a law-abiding and pro-social partner who has known you for 13 years and with whom you have been in a relationship since early 2019. That partner owns her own home, is employed, as a product returns coordinator for ASKO Appliances and is undertaking a Masters in Business Administration, that is an MBA. Your partner wrote that she has been in continual contact with you whilst in custody and that she believed your time there had been life changing and that you are now bent on addressing your addiction issues. You intend to live with your partner at her home when you are released from custody.
50Her mother also wrote in support of you and of the fact that you had expressed to her shame and embarrassment for your offending. She continues to have contact with you and offers her support and is confident that you are intent upon a reformed life on your release.
51Your mother Vera Dukic also wrote of your desire to reform stating that you had accepted all your faults and that you were seeing a counsellor which is something you would not countenance previously. She wrote that both she and your younger brother are committed to supporting you into the future, which she said included settling down with your partner and starting a family. Ms Dukic wrote that she had secured a full-time job for you as a driver for a crane truck with a family friend on your release. I received a confirmatory letter to that effect from Devor Djekic, spelt Djekic, confirming you would be employed by his company Double D Logistics and confirmed that he is aware of your offending and that he has known you since you were a young - a small boy.
52I received a number of impressive family - references from family and friends who have known you and your family since you were young, and who all wrote of the difficulties you faced at your family's hands. These references were from persons I am satisfied were of high moral standards including senior child protection practitioner a person involved at your former soccer club and a cousin who is also an associate director of nursing. They all spoke of years of education and sporting prowess and then descent into drugs. Your younger brother Alexander wrote that you had apologised to him many times for the heartache your offending has caused your family and he noted your desire to return to participate in a voluntary way with your old soccer club.
53Finally, another family friend, Ms Tomic wrote that she saw the violence inflicted by your father, she saw your struggles to overcome your soccer injuries, your mother's attempts to support you and then your descent into drug use. Those observations were seconded also by a second family friend Ms Lukic, a teacher at Doveton College and who described you as just like the other referees. As a family oriented and loving person whose personality was drastically changed due to the descent into drugs. I also received a letter from you Mr Dukic which I found to be a genuine piece of writing where you described that the person you became under the influence of drugs saying you were both a drug and gambling addict who surrounded himself with strangers, 'choosing to play the pokies rather than be at my childhood best friend's Sul's first birthday.' You wrote that your time in remand had saved your life, stating,
'Whilst in gaol, I am making every possible effort to reach full rehabilitation through any courses available working on my fitness, sessions with the prison psychologist, practicing faith you have returned to your Christian Orthodox church.'
54You expressed what I also regard as genuine remorse for your offending and your hopes to live a pro-social and drug-free life in the future with your partner. In what I regarded as an extremely helpful report, Dr Barthe wrote,
'Due to the abusive experience during your childhood, Mr Dukic's self-identity is poorly developed. His abusive relationship with his father bullying him in his primary school years and early exposure to criminal behaviour appears to have left him without a solid foundation to develop a sustainable sense of self-worth. Mr Dukic has experienced longstanding feelings of self-doubt.'
55I regard that finding as significant in your case. It goes to the importance of soccer to you as a means of finding some self-esteem and the devastation that the injury meant insofar as it ended your soccer career. I accept that you after actively awarding drug use you eventually were drawn into it because of your emotional state and were assisted in doing so by your father and brother who were themselves entrenched drug users.
56Dr Barthe believed that you had an emerging insight into the issues associated with your drug use, especially your use of it as a means of enhancing your self-esteem (indistinct words) enhancing your self-esteem, and he noted that you were able to demonstrate a solid appreciation of the negative impacts of drugs in your life. He did describe you as an immature man for your age, who tended to be impulsive and reckless and to compensate feelings of insecurity.
57He did state that he believed that your commitment to abide by treatment that you might require, your current abstinence from drugs, the progress you have achieved and the support of your partner and family were positive (indistinct) factors. He finally stated,
'Provided that he fully engages in the relevant commitment and supervision requirements, a degree of guarded optimism maybe justified in Mr Dukic's ultimate rehabilitative prospects.'
58I indicated to you on the plea Mr Dukic that I fully understood and appreciated the efforts you have made in custody and I also accept that on your release you will have a job - sorry you will have a job and accommodation. You will have the important supports in your partner, her mother, your mother, your brother and a host of family friends. I accept that you have done everything you can to rehabilitate yourself in custody during difficult times. Most importantly by seeking out and undertaking the program that I have referred to, and by remaining abstinent from drug use. I am prepared to entertain a guarded optimism as to your future and I do accept that despite the gravity of your offending and it was extremely grave, that you do sincerely wish to reform.
59I accept your plea of guilty was sought to be entered following a pre-trial ruling of early 2021, however it cannot be said that this was an early plea. Nevertheless, I am satisfied on the material before me including the references and the psychological report, that you are remorseful for your offending.
Mr Dan submitted the delay was a significant mitigatory factor that I should take into account in sentencing you, however I do accept the prosecution submission that much of this delay lay in the conduct of your offence including pre-trial submissions and a request by you at one stage for an adjournment so that scientific evidence could be checked by an expert of choice.60I do not criticise you for that, but do not accept delay in this matter has much prominence in the sentencing exercise before me. Having said that, I certainly accept that your time in custody has been well used by you. It has gone a considerable way to my forming a more positive view of your prospects of rehabilitation and a lessening of your likelihood that you will present a danger to the community in the future. Nevertheless, I accept the prosecution's submission that given that the 2019 offending occurred whilst you were on bail for very similar offending in 2017, despite the reasons posited for it, the issue as specific deterrence that is a term designed to achieve your reformation is still live.
61I do accept that the principles enunciated in Bugmy have application in your case. That is, you suffered a significant and ongoing childhood trauma at the your father’s hands, which undermined your self-worth. You were actively assisted in turning to drugs for consolation once your hopes of a soccer career were dashed by your own father and brother and therefore according to the principles laid down by the High Court in that case, your moral culpability for the offending is somewhat reduced.
62I accept that your prior criminal history fell into a much lesser category of criminality and that the offending before this court represents a marked escalation. It was of course conceded by your counsel that the only appropriate response to this offending is one involving the imposition of a term of imprisonment to be immediately served.
63I also take into account in sentencing you the principles laid down by the
Court of Appeal in Worboyes[1], relating to the value to be placed on a plea of guilty made at a time when the pandemic restrictions, see this court dealing with a large backlog of cases, so that any plea of guilty must attract more than usual litigation. I accept also that in your case, the plea of guilty has relieved the community of the burden would have undoubtedly been a lengthy and complex trial.[1] [2021] VSCA 169.
64I also accept that you have served time in custody during a particular period of difficulty brought about by the pandemic restrictions so that - resulting in a more than ordinarily difficult experience in gaol. So, while I note the prosecution did not demur from the explanation profit by your counsel with the committing of these offences in particular, that in 2017 you were storing guns and drugs for other criminal associates, that still means however you were participating and enabling the activities of this criminal cohort, both in 2017 and 2019 and must be sentenced as such.
65Overall, it is my view that a maximum period of six years is appropriate in your case, despite the urgence of your counsel that I should lessen it. The principles of general deterrence and indeed specific deterrence are dominant in the sentencing exercise before me and it is my view even taking into account all the mitigating factors I have referred to, those competing issues are appropriately met by that maximum term.
66Ultimately, I have decided that your continued efforts of rehabilitation do warrant some lessening of the minimum term I had otherwise proposed, but only by a matter of months.
67I therefore sentence you as follows.
68On Charge 1, you are sentenced to two years' imprisonment.
69On Charge 2, you are sentenced to three years' imprisonment.
70On Charge 3, you are sentenced to 18 months' imprisonment.
71On Charge 4, you are sentenced to 12 months' imprisonment.
72On Charge 5, you are sentenced to two years' imprisonment.
73On summary offence 6, you are fined $100.
74On Summary Charge 8, you are sentenced to 12 months' imprisonment.
75On Summary Charge 11, you are sentenced to nine months' imprisonment.
76Returning to the indictment, on Charge 6 you are sentenced to two years' imprisonment.
77Charge 7, you are sentenced to two years' imprisonment.
78On Charge 8 you are sentenced to one year imprisonment.
79On the associated summary offence 10, you are sentenced to four months' imprisonment.
80And associated summary offence 11, one month imprisonment.
81The base sentence will be the sentence imposed on Charge 2, with three years' imprisonment.
82I order that six months of the sentence imposed on Charge 1, four months of the sentence imposed on Charge 3, six months of the sentence imposed on Charge 5, four months of the sentence imposed on associated summary offence 8, six months of the sentence imposed on Charge 6 on the indictment, six months of the sentence imposed on Charge 7 and four months of the sentence imposed on Charge 8, be served cumulatively to the sentence imposed on Charge 2 and to all other sentences. This gives a total effective sentence of six years and I order that you serve a minimum term of three years and eight months before becoming eligible for parole. May I ask what the PSD is please?
83MR GRANT: Sorry, Your Honour. It is four days since Monday and it was
1,153 on Monday so a total of 1,157 days.84HER HONOUR: Well, I declare that 1,150 days of that sentence have already been served by way of pre-sentence detention - - -
85MR GRANT: That should be - sorry Your Honour, sorry to interrupt, 1,100 - I'll start again 1,157 days - - -
86HER HONOUR: I thought that's what I said, 1,157 days of that sentence have already been served by way of pre-sentence.
87MR GRANT: Thank you, Your Honour.
88HER HONOUR: Pursuant to s6AAA I declare that had you not pleaded guilty I would have sentenced you to a term of imprisonment of seven years and
six months and ordered that you serve a minimum term of five years. Sorry, that was so long there was just so much to cover unfortunately, I do apologise to everyone having to sit through that. Now Mr Dukic I wish you well, Sir.89OFFENDER: Thank you, thank you, Your Honour.
90HER HONOUR: I hope as I said, I very much appreciate the effort you've made. As I said to you at the plea hearing, you put in a lot of good crime fee years. If you can stay on top of your drug program you stand in a good - you've got a good opportunity to go back to the young man you were of about 19 or 20, all right?
91OFFENDER: Yes, Your Honour, thank you.
92HER HONOUR: Thank you very much.
93OFFENDER: Thank you, Your Honour.
94HER HONOUR: I thank counsel very much - - -
95MR GRANT: Your Honour, there is one other matter, Your Honour. I think my instructor sent through some forfeitures to make orders.
96HER HONOUR: Yes. I'll make those orders, the disposal order and the forfeiture order. Can I thank counsel very much for their assistance. In particular, you Mr Grant, you've been in this case right from the start, it's been a very complex matter and I have been very grateful for your assistance. And you can pass on my thanks to Mr Dan, I'd hate for him to feel left out.
97MR GRANT: As Your Honour pleases.
98MS MILIDES: Thank you.
99HER HONOUR: Thank you very much indeed. Yes, thank you, we will adjourn to 10.30, thank you very much. Thank you.
100MR GRANT: As Your Honour please.
101MS MILIDES: It please the court.
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