Director of Public Prosecutions v Jellett (a pseudonym)

[2019] VCC 1328

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

AT LATROBE VALLEY
CRIMINAL JURISDICTION

DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS

v

RONALD JELLETT (A PSEUDONYM)

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JUDGE:	HIS HONOUR JUDGE SMALLWOOD
WHERE HELD:	Latrobe Valley
DATE OF HEARING:	19 August 2019
DATE OF SENTENCE:	22 August 2019
CASE MAY BE CITED AS:	DPP v Jellett (a pseudonym)
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION:	[2019] VCC 1328

REASONS FOR SENTENCE
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Subject:
Catchwords:
Legislation Cited:
Cases Cited:
Sentence:

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APPEARANCES:	Counsel	Solicitors
For the Director of Public Prosecutions	Ms D. O'Doherty	Office of Public Prosecutions
For the Accused	Mr R. Davis	Robert Davis

HIS HONOUR:

1Ronald Mark Jellett,[1] you have pleaded guilty to one charge of common assault, one charge of burglary, one charge of theft, one charge of make a threat to kill, one charge of persistent contravention of a family violence order, one charge of aggravated burglary and one charge of intentionally causing injury.  Those crimes carry maximum penalties of five years, 10 years, 10 years, 10 years, five years, 25 years and 10 years respectively.

[1] A pseudonym.

2You also pleaded guilty to two uplifted summary matters and in respect of each of those, I have simply sentenced you to be imprisonment on each one for a period of two months to be served concurrently with the sentences to be imposed on the indictment.

3The circumstances of the offending are that you and Edwina Comb,[2] the victim in this matter, met in the residential units under DHS care some years ago.  You were 14 and she was 15.  You are now 30 and she is 31. You have been in an on and off relationship for all that time. Her two children are yours. On Friday 20 October 2017 you sent her a series of text messages indicating that you were going to come to the house.  You arrived in what was clearly a drugged state and she feared for her safety.  She asked you to leave.  You walked away but came back.  You knocked on the door and asked to see the children and you promised her you would not be violent, but when you walked inside you began verbally abusing her, calling her, 'A slut', and, 'A copper loving dog'.

[2] A pseudonym.

4You accused her of turning your son against you.  You continued to abuse her, she kept telling you to go.  You asked for money and she said she could not, would not give it to you.  You then took her bankcard which she tried to get back.  At that point you grabbed her, pushed her into the driver's side seat of the car.  She fell backwards and you grabbed her neck with both hands and squeezed it to the point she could not breathe.  She struggled and kicked your legs repeatedly.  In the end, you let go of her neck and bit her left arm.  That is the first charge of common assault.

5Burglary and theft.  On 26 March you went to a house in High Street in Inverloch.  It is a short-term rental house.  You got in the back by using a drill and gloves.  You then stole most of the contents of the house including two televisions, a stereo, a PlayStation, other electronic appliances, furniture and assorted household items.  In other words, you pretty much cleared the house out.  A number of those items were recovered at a later time.  That is as I said, burg and theft.  You were bailed for that and failed to appear, which is one of the summary charges.

6The Charge 6, which was a - sorry.  The family violence order, summary related offence.  I do not think I will have to go into the detail of all that.  It is contained with all the matters that are referred to here.  Charge 4, make a threat to kill, was on 20 September 2018.  Ms Comb was at home, heard you knocking at the door, recognised your voice.  She opened the front door, you asked to come in and she said no.  You then walked off and yelled, 'I'm gonna kill youse'.  She was terrified.  From past experience she had every reason to be.  In any event, she contacted police and made a statement that night.

7Charge 5, persistent contravention of a family violence intervention order, includes all these other matters and any sentence on that is just going to be straight out concurrent.

8Charges 6 and 7 of aggravated burglary and intentionally causing injury.  On 8 October 2018, she was at home with her daughter.  Her son had just left for school.  About 8.30 am she was walking towards the front door and you walked into the house without invitation.  You verbally abused her, calling her, 'A slut', and telling her she was the reason you are, 'Going back to gaol for breaching the intervention order'.

9You punched her in the upper arm about five times, causing pain.  She told you to stop because you were hurting her.  You then grabbed her around the neck with both hands and choked her, as you forced her down the hall to her bedroom.  You threw her onto the bed and continued to choke her.  She was struggling to breath and bent one of your little fingers back, trying to break your grip.  You let go and punched her in the face.  She could hear her daughter screaming.  She pleaded with you to stop.  This, all in front of the daughter and your response was simply, 'I don't give a fuck'.  You then told her she was, 'Shit', 'Should kill herself and jump in front of a bus'.  You then threatened you would get DHHS to remove the children from her.

10As a result of that assault and aggravated burglary, she suffered bruising to her left upper arm and face.  She also experienced a pain in her throat.  It is a situation where there has to be accumulation between the assault and the actual aggravated burglary itself.  And it is partially because of the whole history of all this.  When you were interviewed, you said that it was not a burglary, that you were living out the back.  How much to the truth of that, essentially half admitted and half denied offences. 

11You are 30 years of age.  You did plead guilty.  Remorse is pretty problematic, I suspect but you must get the - I will give you the benefit of the doubt.  Utilitarian benefit obviously that you must be granted for removing the need for probably a couple of trials and the need for people to give evidence.  You do have a very significant criminal history.  For these purposes, I think it suffice if I read from the chronology, in part, that was prepared by the Crown because it gives the history of how all this has come about.

12As I said, the pair of you met when you were mid-teens, very young.  In October 2007 at Latrobe Valley Magistrates' Court you were sentenced of threat to kill, intentionally causing injury to her.  Because of these prior convictions of course you are to be sentenced as a serious violent offender on Charges 4 and 7.  I am aware that community protection becomes the principle sentencing purposes.  The sentences are to be cumulative unless otherwise ordered and I will be so ordering for reasons of totality and the Crown do not seek a disproportionate sentence.

13But in any event, you received, including other matters, five months suspended for 12 months.  In September 2008 you were brought back for breach of that suspended sentence.  That suspended sentence was breached by intentionally causing injury to her.  You were also sentenced for that.  You were given five months' youth detention on each charge, with a total of seven months' youth detention all up.

14In August 2011 you were sentenced at Latrobe Valley Magistrates' Court, again threats to kill and recklessly causing injury to her.  You were sentenced in the County Court at Latrobe Valley on a charge of aggravated burglary, intentionally causing injury not related to her, on an individual matter you were given in that situation three years and two months with a non-parole period of 14 months.  You were granted parole in relation to that sentence on 9 January 2013.

15On 26 March 2013 an intervention in her favour was granted.  The next day you were released.  On 18 November 2013 your parole was cancelled.  Because of the chronology I am assuming that was at least partly because of assaults on her which would have occurred prior to that date of the 18th.  On 9 January 2014 you were actually found and reclaimed and forced to serve the remaining one year nine months and 17 days of your sentence.

16On 1 August 2014, and these are matters which I think were what had you brought back by the Parole Board, you were sentenced in the Latrobe Valley Magistrates' Court to three years with a non-parole period of two years on charges including family violence order, unlawful assaults, threats to kill and stalking in relation to her as well as other matters.  The charges relating to her from 9 November and 11 November 2013, which clearly pre-date the cancellation of your parole.

17That was appealed and on 9 September 2014 the County Court in Latrobe Valley resentenced you to an aggregate 21 months with a new non-parole period of nine months.  That parole was not granted.  I am not sure whether you did not ask for it, or they refused you.  The end result was you did the entire sentence.

18On 30 April 2016 you were released.  In 2017, I am told Ms Comb tried to end the relationship and on 20 October 2017 was Charge 1, and it all pretty much flows from there.  There is no victim impact statement.  Hardly surprising in all the circumstances and the milieu in which all this took place.  The simple fact of the matter is, Mr Jellett, intervention orders do not stop you, gaol has never stopped you.  The offending has to be regarded as serious.  In my view, very serious domestic violence.

19It calls for the application of general and specific deterrence, denunciation, appropriate punishment and community protection, in this situation relating specifically to her, there is no benefit to anybody, and I am not buying into what happens within the relationship itself, but you just cannot do this.  A significant gaol term is inevitable. 

20I then look to matters personal to you and Mr Davis on your behalf, who has known you for quite some time, was able to put forward a number of matters.  There is a report from Mr Warren Simmons, the psychologist.  The basis of that is that you have had a rough life.  There is no activation of the principals involved in Verdins in this position.  You do have a good work record.  You have done courses in gaol this time, which is to your credit.  You are working seven days a week in the kitchen at Hopkins, which again to your credit and I take into account that you are doing the sentence in protection.

21As I understand, that you as a concreter, you when able to work and free from drugs and the like, have a good work record and work ultimately will be available to you upon your ultimate release.  I think it has reached a point where there is no real purpose in going through in detail all your history.  The simple fact of the matter is you have done this before, you have been gaoled for it before and you have repeatedly done it again.  The prospects of your rehabilitation, I think guarded is the appropriate word.  Some might say bleak.  The risk of you reoffending if you use drugs and try and maintain this relationship, is going to be, I think, high.

22I am aware of the principles of totality, as I have already indicated, and I do not want to impose a sentence that is crushing.  In all these circumstances, putting it bluntly, Mr Jellett, you have reached the end of the line in terms of this sort of offending and the sentence must reflect the courts and the community's abhorrence of violence in domestic relationship and violence against women.  Accordingly, you are sentenced as follows:

23Charge 1, 18 months;

24Charge 2, 24 months;

25Charge 3, 12 months;

26Charge 4, 12 months;

27Charge 5, 12 months;

28Charge 6, 36 months;

29Charge 7, 24 months.

30I direct that nine months of Charge 1, 12 months of Charge 2, three months of Charge 4 and 12 months of Charge 7 be served cumulatively upon each other and upon the sentence imposed on Charge 6.  That means that the sentences on Charges 3 and 5 are concurrent.  That gives an effective head sentence of 6 years.  I direct you serve a minimum term of four years before becoming eligible for parole. 

31Pursuant to s.6AAA I say that but for your pleas of guilty I would have given you nine with a six.  And I direct that 308 days be reckoned as having been served under this sentence.  All make sense?

32MR DAVIS:  Yes, Your Honour.

33HIS HONOUR:  All right.  (Indistinct) You can keep him on the screen for Mr Davis to talk to, for a moment.

34MR DAVIS:  Thank you, sir.

35MS O'DOHERTY:  Apologies, Your Honour, if I missed it, but on the, I believe the summary offences?

36HIS HONOUR:  Yes.  I have already said that, two months each, concurrent.

37MS O'DOHERTY:  Sorry, Your Honour.  Sorry.

38HIS HONOUR:  Yes, yes. 

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