Director of Public Prosecutions v Quinton

[2020] VCC 271

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

AT MELBOURNE
CRIMINAL JURISDICTION

CR 19-02271

DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS

v

JASON QUINTON

---

JUDGE:	HIS HONOUR JUDGE LACAVA
WHERE HELD:	Melbourne
DATE OF HEARING:	12 February 2020
DATE OF SENTENCE:	17 March 2020
CASE MAY BE CITED AS:	DPP v QUINTON
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION:	[2020] VCC 271

REASONS FOR SENTENCE
---

Subject: Robbery, Theft
Sentence: 5 years imprisonment with a non parole period of 3 years.

APPEARANCES:	Counsel	Solicitors
For the Director of Public Prosecutions	Mr B. D. Nibbs	Office of Public Prosecutions
For the Accused	Mr A. Madden

HIS HONOUR:

1Jason Quinton, you have pleaded guilty to one charge of robbery for which the maximum penalty is imprisonment for 15 years and one charge of theft for which the maximum penalty is imprisonment for 10 years.

2Your offending occurred on 20 August 2019 and you were arrested on that day and you were remanded in custody and have remained in custody since that time.  You have served 201 days pre-sentence detention.

3You entered a plea of guilty to the charges at a committal mention on
14 November 2019.

4You have pleaded guilty to the charges at the earliest opportunity and that is to your credit.  By your pleas of guilty, you have saved the time and costs of a trial and you have facilitated the course of justice and you have accepted responsibility for your offending.  For that, you are entitled to a reduction in the sentence that will be imposed and this will be reflected in the sentence that I will shortly pass.  I also treat your guilty pleas as evidence of genuine remorse on your part for this offending.

5The circumstances that bring you before the court are summarised in a Prosecution Opening dated 20 December 2019, which was tendered in evidence and marked as 'Exhibit A' and it was read to the court by the prosecutor, Mr Nibbs.  Your counsel, Mr Madden, agreed that the opening forms a proper factual basis upon which I can proceed to pass sentence upon you.  In those circumstances, it is not necessary that I here, repeat in full, all of the detail of your offending and do so only in an abbreviated way.  These sentencing remarks should, however, be read in conjunction with what is set out in more detail in the prosecution opening.

6At about 9.42 am on 20 August 2019, you carried out a robbery at the Commonwealth Bank Wendouree.  About two weeks before the robbery, you told your father 'I’m going to rob a bank tomorrow', to which your father told you 'Don’t be so bloody stupid'.

7On the morning of the robbery you awoke and after watching morning television, you asked your father for money to buy cigarettes.  Your father gave you $20 and you left.  You visited a hotel and had a pot of beer and played the pokies for about 20 minutes.  You then left the hotel and walked a short distance to McDonalds, where you were given two brown paper bags and you left the store.  You then went to nearby Woolworths where you stole a pair of pantyhose (Charge 1 theft)

8You then went to a laneway behind a chicken shop, where you placed the pantyhose over your head and discarded the packaging.  You placed one of the McDonalds bags over your right hand and made your way to the Commonwealth Bank.  At this time, there were seven staff members working in the bank, two of whom were serving customers from behind the teller windows.  There were six customers in the bank at the time.

9You entered the bank running with your right hand extended out in front of you, pointing the brown paper bag at the staff and customers.  Your clear intent was to instil fear that you had a gun inside the bag.  The staff and customers confronted by you, certainly thought that you had a gun.  You shouted 'This is a hold up nobody move'.  You went to the teller windows shouting 'Give us all the money'.  You made repeated demands for all the money placing the other McDonalds bag on the counter.  You demanded 'Put it in the bag'.  All the time you were shouting your demands for money, you were described as being agitated and jumpy.

10One of the tellers placed $1,080 into the bag.  She told you there was no more.  You grabbed the bag and ran from the bank.  Two of the customers chased you and apprehended you until police arrived and you were arrested.  You were soon after interviewed and you made full admissions.

11You told police you were short of cash and broke and you do not get money from State Trustees.  You admitted putting the bag over your right hand to make it look like you had a gun.  You said that the thought to rob the bank came to you naturally that morning.  You admitted stealing the pantyhose to disguise your face.

12By your actions you instilled considerable fear into some of the customers and staff who were in the bank.  I have admitted into evidence three victim impact statements, one from a customer and the others from staff in the bank.  They all continue to suffer from fear and anxiety as a result of what you did.  One has developed symptoms of PTSD.  One of the customers in her witness statement told of how she felt sick, and her heart was racing, as she attended a teller window, as she thought she might be shot as you pointed the paper bag at the teller.

13This is clearly serious offending and your counsel did not suggest otherwise.  He acknowledged that the only available disposition in a case like this, is one of immediate imprisonment and the fixing of a non-parole period.  That is because the sentence must properly reflect application of the principles of deterrence (both general and specific), denunciation, protection of the public and your prospects for rehabilitation.

14Here, your clear intention was to obtain money by putting people in fear.  As I have said, you clearly achieved that intention and you obtained the money.  You clearly thought about what you were going to do and probably had been thinking about it for some time, having mentioned what you were going to do to your father two weeks earlier.  You took steps to disguise yourself.  On the other hand, although you conducted yourself as a determined robber inside the bank, you went there on foot and you do not appear to have planned a getaway.  As a result, you were captured immediately after the robbery.  To that extent, the robbery can be considered as being somewhat unsophisticated. 

15As I shall turn to shortly, you have long suffered from the mental illness schizophrenia, for which you had been prescribed depot medication.  However, you were also a user of illicit drugs, principally methamphetamine (ICE).  Records show that at the time of offending, you were thought to be reasonably compliant with your medication and your mental state was thought to be stable and it has not been suggested otherwise.

16You are aged 46 and you have admitted a number of prior convictions from six previous court appearances.  Relevantly, in July 1995, you were sentenced to three months imprisonment on charges of intentionally or recklessly causing injury and criminal damage.  You did not thereafter re-offend until September 2010, when you were dealt with for shop theft.  In October 2017, you were sentenced in this court on a charge of arson.  You received a combination sentence of imprisonment for 10 months and a community corrections order for a period of two years.  This offending occurred whilst that community corrections order was still on foot and so breached that order.  That is an aggravating feature of this offending.

17I turn to your background history, much of which is documented by Ballarat Health and I have now been provided with documents about you from that body.  A discharge summary from Grampians Psychiatric Services dated
29 September 1997, shows you were diagnosed as suffering an acute psychosis.  The document shows you had previously been a patient at a psychiatric unit in Port Macquarie for two months, after what is described as 'smashing up a house'.  It was noted that you had a police history in Port Macquarie for assault, stalking people and drug and alcohol problems.

18In March 2009, you were seen at Ballarat Health, after having a symptoms of relapse because of non-compliance with medication.  The diagnosis recorded is that of 'Bipolar Disorder currently hypomania DD – Schizoaffective Disorder'.  The clinical notes record that you were then living with your parents and working part time.  It is also recorded that you have one child.  The clinical notes record the following about you:

'He has a previous diagnosis of Schizophrenia and also a history of mood disturbance.  He first presented in 1997 with depressive symptoms.  He recently presented experiencing a hypomanic episode and was diagnosed with Bipolar Affective Disorder, with a differential diagnosis of Schizoaffective Disorder.  His presentation was in the context of non-compliance with medications, along with an increase in drug use, namely heroin.  Jason is wanting to live on his own to increase his independence, is experiencing some stress in the context of expressed emotion within family, has some difficulty caring for his daughter, is attempting to reduce drug use, and has limited finances'.

19In 2009, it was noted that your parents were giving you their full support.  Your father has been in court to support you on both occasions that you have appeared before me.

20In 2013, you saw Dr Singh, a psychiatrist at Ballarat Health on a number of occasions.  During the first half of the year, the reports of Dr Singh reflect that you were progressing well and compliant with your medication.  However, on
6 August 2013, Dr Singh wrote to your general practitioner, Dr Stobart saying 'Jason reports being non-compliant with his depot injection for six weeks.  He also reports using ICE a couple of times a week with his mates'.

21On 10 November 2016, the Mental Health Tribunal made a Compulsory Treatment Order for a period of six months.  Notes supporting that order record you as using 1pt of ICE per day, and you as having a long history of intravenous drug usage and Cannabis 'a few times per week'.

22A progress note from Ballarat Health Services dated 29 July 2019, about a month before you offended, records your use of ICE and of drug paraphernalia being found in your room and of you associating with drug using associates.  It records you as having repeatedly asked your father for money in the past.  It also records that substance use quickly impacts on your mental state with disorganisation and disordered thinking. 

23A number of documents from Ballarat Health record your mental state to be stable at the time of offending.

24What comes through from all of the documentation relating to you is that you have had a long term diagnosis of Schizophrenia and substance use disorder.  You are well aware of the consequences to you if you do not comply with a prescribed depot medication regime and you are well aware, having been repeatedly advised, that you should not take illicit drugs because of the consequences to you, particularly with your diagnosed mental illness.  You know that the two do not mix.  In my judgment, your moral culpability for this offending is in no way diminished because of your mental illness and it was not suggested otherwise.

25Having said that, in my view because of your diagnosed mental illness, I think your time in custody will be harder than for most and I am conscious of the fact that the sentence I will impose will be the longest sentence that you would have had to face.

26When this matter was first listed for plea before me on circuit at Ballarat, on
12 February 2020, your counsel Mr Madden asked me to request a pre-sentence report, without any other submissions or supporting evidence.  I declined to do that and adjourned the plea for further on 5 March 2020.  At that time,, a number of medical records about you from Ballarat Health, were made available resulting in the potted history that I have set out above.

27You are on a disability support pension and your affairs are in the hands of State Trustees.  I understand and accept that at times, this has been frustrating for you, not being able to access your money.  Up until the time of arrest, you were living in supported accommodation at Merindah Lodge near Ballarat.

28I have set out the purposes of sentencing in a case like this above.  In your case, because you have prior convictions for relevant offending, the sentence must appropriately address some specific deterrence, as well as the other sentencing principles.  I assess your prospects of rehabilitation as being poor. 

29On the charge of theft, you are convicted and sentenced to a term of imprisonment of seven days.

30On the charge of robbery, you are convicted and sentenced to a term of imprisonment of five (5) years.

31I direct that you serve a minimum term of three (3) years before being eligible for release on parole.

32I declare that there has been 201 days pre-sentence detention relating to the sentence passed this day and direct that 201 days be reckoned as having been already served, be entered into the records of the court and be deducted administratively.

33For the purposes of s. 6AAA of the Sentencing Act 1991, had it not been for your pleas of guilty to the charges at the earliest opportunity, I would have imposed a sentence of seven and a half years imprisonment and fixed a non-parole period of five years.  Are there any questions arising out of that Mr Nibbs?

34MR NIBBS:  No thank you, Your Honour.

35HIS HONOUR:  Mr Madden?

36MR MADDEN:  Just a minor matter, Your Honour.  The theft is it cumulative or concurrent with the head sentence?

37HIS HONOUR:  Well the Sentencing Act takes care of that.  I haven't expressed it to be cumulative, so it will be concurrent.

38MR MADDEN:  As Your Honour pleases.

39HIS HONOUR:  Would you take Mr Quinton into custody please. 

‑ ‑ ‑