Director of Public Prosecutions v Puglisi

[2022] VCC 9

IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA

Revised

Not Restricted

Suitable for Publication

AT MELBOURNE

CRIMINAL JURISDICTION

CR 21-01773

DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS

v

ETHAN PUGLISI

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JUDGE:	HIS HONOUR JUDGE SMALLWOOD
WHERE HELD:	Melbourne
DATE OF HEARING:
DATE OF SENTENCE:	17 January 2022
CASE MAY BE CITED AS:	DPP v Puglisi
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION:	[2022] VCC 9

REASONS FOR SENTENCE

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Cases Cited:

Sentence:

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APPEARANCES:	Counsel	Solicitors
For the Director of Public Prosecutions	Mr M. Roper	Office of Public Prosecution
For the Accused	Ms M. Shanahan	Slades & Parsons

HIS HONOUR:

1Ethan Puglisi, you have pleaded guilty to one charge of attempted armed robbery.  That crime carries a maximum penalty of 20 years' imprisonment.  You pleaded guilty at a reasonably early opportunity and must get the benefit of that.  You are still only 23 years of age.

2You do have a significant criminal history which is obviously of real concern.  You have been imprisoned before for offences like this and even at your age I think there is a real risk of institutionalisation which should be avoided if at all possible.

3You clearly get the utilitarian benefit of that plea of guilty, particularly in these times of Worboyes and the COVID problems at the moment.  Insofar as remorse is concerned, it is highly problematic but I will give you the benefit of the doubt and I say no more about that.

4I sentence you on the basis that the sentence of imprisonment that you have undergone has been under COVID circumstances and the relatively short period of time that you will have to undergo further sentence will also be under circumstances of COVID and the difficulties that that brings about for accused people.

5The offending involved you, on 22 January 2021, with a co-offender who was dealt with in the Children's Court (parity is of no concern of mine), went into a convenience store in Broadmeadows.  One of you had a black imitation pistol and the other had a black extendable baton.  It is unclear which of you had what, I do not think it matters a lot.

6In any event, the owner of the convenience store managed to push you out of the shop whereupon your co-accused followed you and, was seen running away, was captured on CCTV and ultimately was discovered by reason of a tattoo as I understand it and various other forensic matters. Cigarette butts placed your co-offender at the scene.

7It is a very short summary of what was a very short incident.  I accept that it is an attempt but the fact of the matter is that both of you were armed, there was also a female present and it was a cowardly act.  Upon being arrested as I understand it, you denied the offending.

8There are two victim impact statements which have been put into evidence and which I have read and which are relatively succinct.  You are very lucky indeed that the emotional damage caused by those actions was not far greater for these two fairly stalwart sort of people.  However, the situation is that not everybody is like that, general deterrence has to play a significant part in the sentencing process.

9In your situation specific deterrence does not seem to have worked in the past but we will just have to see how we go.  The crime is obviously of a serious nature inherently, it does call for denunciation and there must be appropriate punishment.

10In your particular background there has been one situation of a community correction order but you have been released from prison previously, straight into the community with nowhere to go and it is always ended up in disaster.  As I said, there is no parity question here with your co-accused, who from my recollection - I might be wrong about this - did not receive a custodial sentence.

11There is no dispute here that an appropriate disposition is that of a custodial sentence to be followed by a community correction order and in those circumstances I do not need to go through the various authorities that relate to that.

12In brief terms I look to your matters personal.  Tendered on your behalf was a report from a psychologist, a Ms Lofthouse and there was also Youth Justice report which was of real assistance to me.

13Your background is extremely unfortunate.  I have sentenced you on two previous occasions and I am accustomed to it.  In those circumstances I am very concerned about your prospects of rehabilitation.  You are 23, far too young in my view to be basically writing you off.

14You, as a child, were subject to chronic physical and emotional abuse by both your mother and your stepfather, that included being tied to your bed, being denied food, you also witnessed frequent episodes of domestic violence and you witnessed the abuse of alcohol and illicit drugs.  You were apparently also sexually abused by a neighbour at the age of four.

15Nine notifications were made to Child Protection in mid-2005 in respect to all of those various matters and further concerns were raised in December 2005, ultimately on Christmas eve of 2005 your mother relinquished you into the care of Child Protection.  You were only seven years of age.  It simply went from there.

16You moved between several residential care placements and doing so much of this work in the Latrobe Valley, I am well aware of the consequences of all that.  I was reading a statistic the other day that young people who had been in a residential care placement for more than three months, 80 per cent of them, never live above the poverty line.

17In any event you began smoking cannabis at 10, commenced drinking at 13 and 15 you were abusing amphetamines two or three times a week.

18Ultimately in April of 2009 a long term foster placement was found but that broke down and back again you went into residential care.  As is so often the case, you then spent time in youth detention in 2014 and 2015 and you spent virtually all your childhood since the age of seven in residential care.  You exited school at the end of year 7 and have had no formal education since.

19Your work history is scarce, you have been in custody on a number of occasions, you often end up it appears homeless.  You are, in all probability, illiterate, you have great difficulty in accessing Centrelink and you, when in that situation, fall into drug use.  I've noted that at times when you are in prison you are held in protection and I take that into account as well.  You have got the reading age of an eight year old.

20The results of the testing carried out by Dr Lofthouse indicate that you have a mild to moderate level of intellectual impairment with significant deficits in, not sure that you are going to understand this, verbal abstract reasoning and verbal learning.  It is a pretty sad litany of a childhood but that is the way it is.  I am not going to go through it in great detail, I am not going to sit here and embarrass you. 

21It seems pretty clear to me that the principles involved Muldrock, the principles involved in Bugmy, some of the principles involved in Verdins, all apply in your given situation.  You are still only 23 and if you can somehow or other turn your life around you could be a useful member of the community and hopefully not spend the rest of your life in gaol which unfortunately at the moment is well on the cards.

22You have now been in custody on this matter for 270 days and what I am going to do in all these circumstances is having had you assessed for a community correction order and being found suitable, is to send you to a period of imprisonment with such an order to follow.

23Accordingly, you are sentenced to a period of imprisonment of 12 months.  I direct that 270 days be reckoned as having been served under that sentence.  Upon your release from this sentence of imprisonment, placed on a community correction order which will be with conviction, will last for two years and you will have the conditions that you undergo assessment and treatment for drug abuse, mental health assessment and any treatment that involves, you must anticipate in programs or courses related to the offending, related to offending as directed by the regional manager.

24There was a situation where the report from Corrections suggested judicial monitoring but in these circumstances, especially with COVID, that is a virtual impossibility when people are so far apart.

25What you have got to understand, Ethan, is if you breach this - and you know these things from the past - if you breach it and you get brought back before me there will be no alternative but to put you back in, all right?  You do not want to suddenly wake up when you are 40 years of age where your sole conversations are with other long term prisoners and discussing which gaols you get the best feed in.  That is where your life is headed, mate, so do not do that.

26Prospects for rehabilitation are guarded, the risk of you re-offending, if you do relapse into drug use has to be regarded as high and I take all those matters into account.

27So far as - assuming you agree to the community correction order - pursuant to s6AAA of the Sentencing Act I say that but for your plea of guilty you would have been sentenced to be imprisoned for a period of two and a half years with a minimum term of one and a half years.

28You agree to the community correction order?

29OFFENDER:  Yes, Your Honour.

30HIS HONOUR:  I will make that order.  Is there any other matters I need, Ms Shanahan or Mr Roper?  I have made all the other - all the forfeitures have been made, I think.

31MR ROPER:  All right, that was the only matter I was going to raise.  But those orders have already been made.

32HIS HONOUR:  That is all good.  Do you need to have a quick yarn to him, Ms Shanahan?

33MS SHANAHAN:  Your Honour, if that can be facilitated, I'd be greatly appreciative.

34HIS HONOUR:  Are you in the other matter at quarter to two or is that going to be Mr Anderson?

35MS SHANAHAN:  Your Honour, I'm instructed that Mr Anderson will be appearing.

36HIS HONOUR:  All right, fine, that's no problem.  All right, yes, that being the case, we will adjourn.

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