Director of Public Prosecutions v Hall

[2017] VCC 775

IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA Revised
(Not) Restricted
Suitable for Publication

AT LATROBE VALLEY
CRIMINAL JURISDICTION

CR 17-00789

DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS

v

TIMOTHY HALL

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JUDGE:	HIS HONOUR JUDGE SMALLWOOD
WHERE HELD:	Latrobe Valley
DATE OF HEARING:
DATE OF SENTENCE:	15 June 2017
CASE MAY BE CITED AS:	DPP v Hall
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION:	[2017] VCC 775

REASONS FOR SENTENCE
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Subject:
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Cases Cited:
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APPEARANCES:	Counsel	Solicitors
For the Office of Public Prosecutions	Ms D. Guesdon
For the Accused	Mr D. Robertson

HIS HONOUR:

1Timothy Hall, you have pleaded guilty to one charge of aggravated burglary and one charge of common law assault.  Aggravated burglary carries a maximum penalty of 25 years, common law assault, five years.

2You pleaded guilty at the earliest reasonable opportunity and that indicates remorse.  You must also, of course, get the utilitarian benefit of that plea of guilty.  Yours is an unusual situation where it was an identification case.  It is clear to me that had the matter proceeded as a not guilty the Crown would have had great difficulty in getting the photo board identifications admitted into evidence.  In those circumstances your plea has, in my view, a significantly greater benefit for you.

3There was also a delay of some six months before you were charged with these matters.  I accept that that is no one's fault but the fact of the matter is that you would have had this hanging over your head for that period of time.

4I have also, as indicated to counsel, seen and now have had tendered, the text messages that have been sent to your then partner.  It is clear to me that those text messages were such as to have provoked you into attending at the complainant's address and I accept your counsel's assertion on your behalf that you went there to remonstrate with him but when seeing him snapped.  I think one of your then partner's responses to Mr Woodward in respect of his very unpleasant text was, that they had picked the wrong person.  That may have been a degree of prescience, I suspect.

5In any event, what happened was that you, at 38 years of age, went around to the house of a Mr Woodward.  It is all a bit unclear as to what this was all really about but it seems to have at least started with a disagreement between
Mr Woodward and the father of his de facto partner's child.  In any event, you were 38 years of age, as I have said.  At the time of the offending the complainant, a Mr Adrian Woodward, was in a relationship with a Ms Lauren Jones and had been for approximately seven months.  They lived together with her son, Coby, who is almost one year old.  Coby's father was one, Steven Pruska, who at the time of this offending taking place was only 16 years of age.  He has been dealt with in the Children's Court and received without conviction a good behaviour bond.  You are obviously not in that jurisdiction but Mr Pruska would have to be regarded as a person of some wherewithal in the circumstances in which he found himself.  I am not going to go into the other circumstances of that relationship but, in any event, there was an intervention order.  Mr Pruska had apparently described photos of Coby's birthday as "gay" and Mr Woodward took offence at that.  That argument continued.

6At 5.30 pm on 7 June Mr Woodward said he was in bed after a long day, asleep.  Apparently he claims that his partner was there as well.  At about 7.30 pm he was woken by a knock at the door.  He went to the door and he saw a tall male with red hair wearing a black jumper standing outside the front door.  Whether you had red hair or not is a different matter.  I suspect not.  In any event, he noticed another two males standing nearby, one of whom apparently turned out to be Mr Priska.

7On the Crown case you asked, "Are you Adrian?", to which he replied, "Yes".  You had never met him before, did not know him and you made it clear in the record of interview and at the scene that the reason you were there was because of the texting the victim sent to your partner.  You opened the front security door and, as I accept, snapped and punched the complainant to the face.  He fell backwards into the house.  You walked into the lounge room.  He claimed he said, "Get out of my house", but you did not.

8At that point the girlfriend came in and saw him on the floor and endeavoured to push you out.  She heard you say, "You in-boxed my girlfriend last night".  She claims she continued to push you out of the house, at which point you punched Mr Woodward, the complainant, twice to the back of the head and apparently said, "Steven said you deserve this".  You then backed away.  According to them you said, "If you go to the police this will happen again", and you left in a vehicle with two other males who were at the scene.  Mr Woodward checked his face and noticed a small cut to the inside of his bottom lip.  That seems to be the extent of any injury caused, which is why it is a common law assault, I would imagine.  In any event, they then saw your photo on Mr Priska's Facebook page, and then proceeded to identify you from photo boards, and I have already discussed that.

9This can be a very wide ranging offence, aggravated burglary.  In your situation there was a delay.  You do have prior convictions of significance but they are not of great import in this circumstance and I accept that you were provoked and it was a snap decision.  I do not think it was a premeditated assault or I think you would have done a lot worse than what  you did.  So far as aggravated burglaries are concerned I regard it as being at the lower end of the range.

10The submission was put that a CCO was in range and the Crown do not demur from that proposition.

11You are 38.  You have the sole custody of four children.  You are presently living with your mother and undertake the care of those children.  You have a long record of being a hard working person and at the present time you are a tow truck driver on 24 hour call.  It is hoped that that can be made permanent.

12Subsequent to this you have attended at the Salvation Army and been undergoing an anger management course and get counselling from them, and you have also been getting counselling at Latrobe General Health.  Those matters were put to me from the Bar table and I accept them.  You have clearly taken responsibility for this and are doing something about it.

13That is about all that really needs to be said about this particular matter.  I think you are obviously a hardworking man and you choose to be.  You have got the care of the children and I think that the overall circumstances in which it occurred are at the lower end.  The prospects of your rehabilitation should be good and I think the risk of you reoffending in this way would be low.

14In all those circumstances I think the appropriate disposition is a community corrections order.  It will be with conviction, which is a punishment in itself.  It will be for three years and the only condition I will be putting in it will be 200 work hours.

15MR ROBERTSON:  if Your Honour pleases.

16MS GUESDON:  There are just, what is it, a 464ZF order.

17HIS HONOUR:  Yes, sorry, I forgot about that.  Yes.

18MR ROBERTSON:  May I approach the dock, Your Honour?

19HIS HONOUR:  Yes.  I want you to.

20MR ROBERTSON:  There is consent to the 464 application.

21HIS HONOUR: Yes. All right, pursuant to s.464ZF of the Crimes Act I make an order that you provide a saliva sample for DNA purposes.  Your counsel will explain to you what you need to do about that.  I must advise you that should you refuse to provide or fail to provide such a sample, police can use reasonable force to take it from you and, as I indicated, it will be saliva only, and that order is made and handed down.

22The community correction order is now made and signed by me.  You understand, Mr Hall, it is a CCO community corrections order.  If you breach it by offending like this I will have no choice, it will be that door, all right?  Fair enough?

23ACCUSED:  Yes.

24HIS HONOUR:  Yes.  All right.

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