Director of Public Prosecutions v Maxwell and Rowan

[2014] VCC 754

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

AT MELBOURNE
CRIMINAL JURISDICTION

CR-14-00127
 CR-14-00617

DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS

v

TRACEY MAXWELL
JAMIE ROWAN

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JUDGE:	HIS HONOUR JUDGE SMALLWOOD
WHERE HELD:	Melbourne
DATE OF HEARING:
DATE OF SENTENCE:	22 May 2014
CASE MAY BE CITED AS:	DPP v Maxwell & Rowan
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION:	[2014] VCC 754

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

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APPEARANCES:	Counsel	Solicitors
For the Director	Ms N. Warder
For Accused Maxwell	Ms C. Woodward
For Accused Rowan	Ns A. Centrone

HIS HONOUR: 

1Tracey Maxwell and Jamie Rowan, you have each pleaded guilty to one charge of blackmail.  Blackmail is a crime which carries a maximum penalty of 15 years imprisonment.  You are 43 years and 23 years of age respectively.  Each of you pleaded guilty at the earliest reasonable opportunity.  Each of you has expressed appropriate remorse and each of you must get the utilitarian benefit of that plea of guilty, particularly you Mr Rowan, for reasons I will explain shortly.

2You, Ms Maxwell, have no prior convictions.  You, Mr Rowan, have none of any real concern or relevance though you have been to court before.  There is a co-accused who is indeed your husband Ms Maxwell who has yet to stand trial and I am very conscious of that in making these sentencing remarks.  I have read the material that has been tendered on your behalf, Ms Maxwell, and I think everyone here understands what the disposition is going to be.  I do not think we need to into any great detail explaining why that is so.

3The circumstances of the offending were that on the material before me; David Maxwell, your husband Ms Maxwell, loaned a man $7,000.  He then said that he would - at the time that he said that he would take $10,000 in payment, but then when the money was actually handed over or close to that point, said he wanted $14,000.  Of that $7,000, $5,000 of it was taken from your bank account without your knowledge.  You had been approached about the loan and had refused it.

4A short time after that, the victim became unwell and his business, which was already very unprofitable, essentially as I can work it out, failed.  Mr Maxwell then came up the idea of scaring the victim, Mr Martin, into paying a total sum of $25,000. 

5I am not going to go into the details of who said what to who and wear and how.  Suffice to say, from an early stage at least, You Ms Maxwell were involved in what took place.  The victim was told that there were other people involved who had loaned the money and that essentially they were dangerous people.  That was clearly done with the purpose of frightening the victim and not only him, but his partner.

6Mr Maxwell learnt that the victim was expecting a further $18,000 in addition to the $7,000 which he had received for selling the business and that would appear to have prompted or at least supported him in the belief that he could get more.  A series of telephone contacts all then took place, in which the reference to dangerous third persons was more and more apparent.  Mr Maxwell, and this has got nothing to do with either of you two, at one stage approached the victim armed with a firearm.

7This continued until it became necessary for there to be an actual dangerous third party.  You Mr Rowan were brought into the agreement.  You apparently felt that you owed Mr Maxwell in that he had been something of a father figure to you in recent years, and that assisted you in getting off alcohol.  Your role in all this was to make a couple of phone calls and it may well have been that in the initial parts of it, at least, you were not aware that a criminal offence was being carried out.  I have no doubt that by the end of it, you were.  The victim shifted and Mr Maxwell found him.  The fear became so great that the police were told and police told him not to answer the phone.  Further phone messages were left, and then a pre-text conversation took place. 

8You were arrested, Ms Maxwell, and made significant admissions to all this.  You Mr Rowan were arrested and made admissions as well.  It is important to note in your situation that but for those admissions, in all probability you could not have been convicted, certainly, or even charged with the matter.  The benefit for giving such admissions is obviously a very significant one, and in your situation, has been of enormous benefit to you.

9I will say no more about the circumstances of it because there is potentially a trial pending, but I will say this; it has to be regarded as serious, general and specific deterrence usually play an important part.  General deterrence certainly does.  In the case of each of you I am not sure that specific deterrence do, there must be denunciation and there must be an appropriate punishment.  To put fear in someone that their family or partner or whatever it might be could be seriously hurt in circumstances such as this where they are vulnerable and unable to defend themselves in the normal course of events carries with it a custodial sentence.

10In your particular situations, I am persuaded that it is not the disposition here and the Crown do not demur from that position.  Insofar as each of you are concerned, as I have indicated, you Ms Maxwell do not have any prior convictions.  I should interpolate at this stage that I have before me the victim impact statement of Mr Martin, who describes the extreme fear and anxiety that his partner and family members held, his fear for others and that he has become very paranoid and as he described it, feels he no longer knows who he can trust.

11I am not sure what his physical or mental condition may have been before all this, but that victim impact statement certainly brings home the terrifying  consequences for people.

12I think your circumstances can be described very quickly, Ms Maxwell.  You are married to Mr Maxwell, having formed a relationship at the age of 16 years.  You have two children aged 20 and 15 years.  The report from your local GP, Dr Hunter, sums it up. 

"Ms Maxwell has made significant medical presentations in the past six months, there have been high levels of stress and depressed mood in the context of a long-term carer's role for her husband after he was involved in a motor vehicle ten years ago, caring for her older son who has congenital deafness and a mood disorder, as well as struggling with her parenting role with her younger son who she felt was exhibiting some behavioural difficulties and putting his education at risk."

13She said Ms Maxwell seemed to reach crisis in September 2013, where she    described herself as "losing the plot" and felt no longer up to her caring roles.   You were then referred to a psychologist.

14The psychologist goes through various other matters, describing your childhood, the nature of the way you were brought up, the fact that you are a qualified hairdresser, though you only work on a part-time basis at the present time.  In terms of you being incarcerated, if that was to be so, he felt that you would be likely to experience intense anxiety about the welfare of your sons and the maintenance of the household if you are not there.  I think they will be very important factors in sentencing you.

15I accept also from that report that you over the years developed a capacity to placate rather than confront your husbands for the reasons that are outlined in that report and I do not really think we have to take it any further.

16You, Mr Rowan, as I have said have basically saved yourself by making admissions to the police.  In a bizarre way, if you had not, you would not have been charged.  But that is another matter.

17You are now 23, you are in a situation where you have had trouble with drugs in the past but that has played no part in this.  You have had trouble with alcohol, but I am told that that is relatively under control.  The report from Ms Matthews tendered on your behalf indicates that you are 23, that you are in a stable relationship, that you have a child and that your prospects for rehabilitation should be pretty good.  I accept that you bought into this offending because you felt that you owed Mr Maxwell.  That being so, I indicate with regard to each of you, if rehabilitation should be affected and the risk of re-offending should be certainly low.  In those circumstances, I think that community corrections orders for each of you are the appropriate disposition.  They will be of a significant amount of work hours to show the seriousness of the offending and each of you would be very aware that if you were to breach these community corrections orders by way of offending of anything similar to this, I would lock you up.

18All right, so far as those CCOs are concerned they will be with conviction for a period of two years.  The only condition which I will be putting upon them will be work hours, which will be one of 300 hours each, to show the seriousness of what took place.  Sorry, I need to exhibit the report of - yes.  Exhibit 1 that can be.  Do you want to get your client to sign those for me ladies?

19#EXHIBIT 1 -    Reports

20Has your client got a driver's license?

21MS CENTRONE:  He has sir, yes.

22HIS HONOUR:  He has now?

23MS CENTRONE:  He has.

24HIS HONOUR:  All right, those orders are made and handed down.  Can I say to each of you that whatever you do, do not re-offend or you will be in serious bother.  I make this clear too; if personal circumstances arise where you are having trouble doing the work hours and things like that, do something about it.  Most of the breaches - not that we deal with them that often, but we have to deal with them for people where it gets harder and they stick their head in the sand.  They can always be extended, there can be various things that can be done.  You are going to have to do the hours, but do not get stressed out by it, all right.  If something goes wrong, get assistance, do not just put your head down and end up going out the back with him.  All right?

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