Director of Public Prosecutions v Rand (No 2)
[2024] ACTSC 343
•1 November 2024
SUPREME COURT OF THE AUSTRALIAN CAPITAL TERRITORY
Case Title: | DPP v Rand (No 2) |
Citation: | [2024] ACTSC 343 |
Hearing Date: | 1 November 2024 |
Decision Date: | 1 November 2024 |
Before: | Christensen AJ |
Decision: | See [8] |
Catchwords: | CRIMINAL LAW – DRUG AND ALCOHOL SENTENCING LIST – Review – drug and alcohol treatment order – rehabilitation achieved – cybersecurity – Summernats – graduation – order confirmed |
Legislation Cited: | Crimes (Sentencing) Act 2005 (ACT) ss 80O, 80ZH |
Cases Cited: | DPP v Rand [2023] ACTSC 408 |
Parties: | Director of Public Prosecutions ( Crown) Adrian Richard Rand (Participant) |
Representation: | Counsel J Churchill ( DPP) C Duffy ( Participant) |
| Solicitors ACT Director of Public Prosecutions Legal Aid ACT ( Participant) | |
File Numbers: | SCC 280, 281 of 2022 |
CHRISTENSEN AJ:
Introduction
Adrian Rand was sentenced in the Drug and Alcohol Sentencing List on 27 June 2023: DPP v Rand [2023] ACTSC 408 (DPP v Rand).
He was sentenced for offences that occurred in July 2022. The offending behaviour involved physical, and threatening, violence in a family violence context. At the sentence hearing his Honour Refshauge AJ observed that, for an offender in Mr Rand’s circumstances the prospect of seeking reform for offending of this type “can be doubly challenged by the need to address two habits, the attitude to relationships and the dependency on drugs”: DPP v Rand at [3].
The total sentence imposed was one of three years and eleven months imprisonment. Mr Rand had spent a period of some nine months in custody prior to the sentence order, and thereafter the term was suspended for the purposes of a drug and alcohol treatment order (treatment order). The treatment and supervision part of the order was to be for a period of two years, followed by a good behaviour order to commence on 27 June 2025.
Mr Rand has progressed with his rehabilitation with commitment, and has achieved his goals, and those of the Drug and Alcohol Sentencing List treatment team (treatment team) in respect to that rehabilitation. As of October 2024, the treatment team have recommended that Mr Rand be graduated early from the treatment and supervision part of the treatment order.
The seriousness of the offending behaviour, and the progress of rehabilitation that Mr Rand has undertaken and succeeded with, emphasises how far he has come. It is a credit to him, and progress that he should be proud of. It is to be hoped that this progress of rehabilitation, and that Mr Rand is most unlikely to cause such harm to another person, will bring some measure of comfort to the victims of his offending.
Having regard to the position of the treatment team, I am satisfied that it is in the interests of justice to review the treatment order: s 80ZH of the Crimes (Sentencing) Act 2005 (ACT) (Sentencing Act). On Mr Rand’s behalf, it is sought that the order of 27 June 2023 be amended, such that Mr Rand will graduate to the next stage of the sentence of imprisonment suspended under the custodial part of the order. The prosecution supports the application.
The Court agrees that such a progression is appropriate. Mr Rand has achieved the objects of the treatment order: s 80O of the Sentencing Act. Section 80O provides:
80O Objects of drug and alcohol treatment orders
The objects of making a treatment order in relation to an offender is to—
(a)facilitate the rehabilitation of the offender by providing a judicially supervised, therapeutically oriented and integrated treatment regime; and
(b)reduce the offender’s dependency on alcohol or a controlled drug; and
(c)reduce the health risks associated with the offender’s dependency on alcohol or controlled drugs; and
(d)assist with the offender’s integration into the community; and
(e)promote community safety by reducing the level of criminal activity caused by alcohol or controlled drug dependence in offenders.
Orders
Accordingly, the following order is made:
(1) Order 9 of the orders made on 27 June 2023 be amended to read as follows:
(9) Under s 80ZA of the Crimes (Sentencing) Act 2005 (ACT), Adrian Richard Rand be required to sign an undertaking to comply with the offender’s Good Behaviour obligations under s 85 of the Crimes (Sentence Administration) Act 2005 (ACT) from 2 November 2024 until the end of the total sentence, 15 July 2026, with a probation condition that he accept supervision by the Commissioner of ACT Corrective Services or his delegate for the period of the undertaking or such lesser period as the person supervising him considers appropriate and obey all reasonable directions of the person supervising him including as to alcohol and drug testing, counselling and treatment.
Remarks to participant on graduation
Adrian Rand, we now move to celebrate your graduation from the treatment and supervision part of your drug and alcohol treatment order.
It is an opportunity to celebrate the hard work you have done since June 2023, when your treatment order commenced. It is an opportunity to honour what you have achieved in meeting the expectations of the treatment program, of the Court, and of the community. It is also an opportunity for reflection as to the journey of rehabilitation that you have undertaken.
This occasion, and your journey of rehabilitation, is one that has taken place on the lands, amongst the waterways, and the sky of the Traditional Custodians of this Country. I acknowledge this and thank the Custodians for caring for Country for thousands of generations. I pay my respect to their Elders past and present.
I also take this opportunity to express the Court’s gratitude to the members of the treatment team – the previous members and the present members. And I thank all of those who have supported Adrian in his rehabilitation. Their commitment to their roles involves infinite patience, care, and support for the participants, and an occasion such as this reflects the significance of their valuable contributions.
It is, however, ultimately an outcome that can only occur if a participant embraces the opportunity for a treatment order. Adrian is to also be thanked for embracing this opportunity.
It has been my privilege to witness a part of your journey and engage with you in the time that I have sat as a judge in the Drug and Alcohol Sentencing List.
The Court is also privileged today to have the presence of Refshauge AJ who is in attendance to witness your graduation. I trust that you understand that his Honour’s doing so reflects the pride that the Court has in you for your successful completion of your treatment order.
To enable me to understand how far you have come, I have read the original sentence decision. I have also read the reports that were before the Court at the time of your sentencing and records of conversations with McCallum CJ, Refshauge AJ, and Hopkins AJ over the course of your treatment order.
You engaged with alcohol and drug rehabilitation programs and within two weeks of the order having been imposed, you celebrated having been sober for one year. You have now been abstinent of drugs and alcohol for a period of some 29 months, a remarkable achievement for someone who began a descent into substance misuse from an early age.
You have also successfully completed a program related to family violence and developed insight into emotional regulation and conflict management. Over the course of the order you demonstrated your growth as a man to be one who now presents respectfully to others and who is a man of honesty and integrity. You reflected during the order that you are a different person from who you were at the start of the order.
From an early stage of the order, you committed yourself to engaging in study. You commenced education in cyber security and have gone on to excel in your studies. You now understand things such as coding and what an Enigma Machine is – knowledge that exceeds the capacity of this Court.
You achieved an almost perfect progression through the treatment order, with no urinalysis results suggestive of substance abuse, and accrual of only one sanction point for missing an appointment.
You have been able to be present for your family, celebrating a milestone birthday with your mother, and having your father visit from interstate. You have been able to be present to help and support friends. Those family and friends recognise your progress by supporting you here in Court today.
You have also built the foundations to live a successful life, attending to your housing, drivers licences, finances, fitness, and health, albeit there was a setback with this when you enjoyed Summernats a bit too much and got badly sunburned.
Adrian – only you can truly understand the challenges you have faced to reach the point that you have reached today. Like so many who find themselves in the grip of substance dependency, you were exposed to traumatic experiences when you were young and that shaped some of your conduct as an adult.
You are now an adult with a much brighter future. I know that all those who have witnessed your journey and supported you along the way are proud of you. I hope that you are proud of yourself for what you have achieved.
Well done. We wish you well for the future and look forward to seeing the positive contributions you will make to our community.
| I certify that the preceding eight [8] numbered paragraphs are a true copy of the Reasons for Judgment of her Honour Acting Justice Christensen Associate: Date: 13 November 2024 |
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