Director of Public Prosecutions v Rowley
[2020] VCC 43
•31 January 2020
| IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA | Revised Restricted Suitable For Publication |
AT MELBOURNE
CRIMINAL DIVISION
Case No. CR-19-02044
| DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS |
| v |
| TROY ROWLEY |
---
JUDGE: | HER HONOUR JUDGE COHEN | |
WHERE HELD: | Melbourne | |
DATE OF HEARING: | 28 January 2020 | |
DATE OF SENTENCE: | 31 January 2020 | |
CASE MAY BE CITED AS: | DPP v Rowley | |
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION: | [2020] VCC 43 | |
REASONS FOR SENTENCE
---
Subject: Sentencing
Catchwords: Plea of guilty – arson – destroyed own home rented from DHHS – history of depression and anxiety – ceased medication for depression prior to incident – self-medicating with alcohol and cannabis – no injuries caused – no other property damaged – prior criminal record but not for arson – sole custodial parent of two young children
Legislation Cited: Sentencing Act 1991 s6AAA
Cases Cited:R v Verdins [2007] 16 VR 269; DPP v Garrison (a pseudonym) [2016] VCC 311; DPP v Burt (January 2020, unreported); DPP v Zonnerfeldt (January 2020, unreported)
Sentence: 32 months imprisonment with a non-parole period of 19 months.
---
APPEARANCES: | Counsel | Solicitors |
| For the Director of Public Prosecutions | Ms. A. Skinner | Office of Public Prosecutions |
| For the Accused | Ms J. Fallar | Slater & King Lawyers |
HER HONOUR:
1 Troy Rowley, you have pleaded guilty to a charge of arson.
2 The maximum penalty for this offence is 15 years imprisonment.
3 You have also admitted an extensive prior criminal history to which I shall refer later.
4 This charge arises out of your conduct on 5 May 2019, that is, about nine months ago when you caused a fire which effectively destroyed a house in Denise Road, Cobram, which at the time was your home.
5 You were living in that house as a tenant of the Department of Health and Human Services. In other words, this was publicly owned housing. It was a three bedroom, detached house, built of brick with a tiled roof, into which you had moved in December 2017 with your two young children. You were unhappy there from the start, complaining that it was too cold, that there were white ants, and also that on several occasions it was the subject of vandalism and burglary, with walls and windows graffitied and property belonging to you and your children stolen. These break-ins had caused you to feel insecure for yourself and your children, as well as increasing the financial pressure on you. You struggled to maintain any work while being the sole parent of your young children. Your sole income was a single parent pension, and it was stretched to have to replace basic household items that had been stolen, such as plates and kitchen utensils, as well as children's toys and clothes which also had been stolen. Electricity had been disconnected for non-payment on several occasions, and at the time of this offending had been disconnected for some weeks, and you were using candles for light. Your frustration and sense of being wronged in relation to living to this house had apparently festered.
6 You say that as a result of your insecurity there, and what you have also said were threats from a neighbour to burn your house down with your children in it, you had arranged for your children to be living elsewhere for at least some weeks, if not a couple of months, before this incident. They were living with your mother and stepfather, and you knew that to be secure accommodation for them. You visited them more than once a day.
7 You had been diagnosed many years earlier with depression and anxiety, and has been prescribed anti-depressant medication by your general practitioner, but had ceased taking it about a month before this offending. You had been using cannabis and alcohol heavily, and the night before this incident you apparently drank heavily at a friend's place, and in the morning smoked cannabis.
8 During the morning of Sunday, 5 May last year, you went to your mother's house, which is apparently just under four kilometres away from yours and a little out of Cobram. Your children were not there at the time. You were there about half an hour or so, and then asked your mother to drive you back to your house, and that was some time before midday. From her statement to police on the day, it seems you were agitated at the time, talking of hating the house and the people, and getting no help, and you said you would be better off in gaol. You had said, at one stage, that you might as well burn the house down. I should say I have not taken that as a statement of confirmed intent, but it is relevant in how I look at these overall circumstances, as I will explain shortly.
9 After arriving home, you were agitated and began to damage the house and some of the contents. You had petrol in a container, and it was spilt or deliberately poured through the living room area.
10 At around midday, you went next door and spoke with two neighbours there, and asked to borrow a lighter which you took back to your house. The accelerant became ignited and a fire started. You left, went to those neighbours’ house, and left the lighter on the front porch, but did not alert them to the fire that had started. Apparently as you walked back to your house flames completely engulfed it. You left.
11 I am told by your counsel that it was the quick thinking and firefighting experience of one of your neighbours which helped contain the fire, that person disconnecting the gas and starting a hose on the flames. Emergency services were called and arrived at around 12.26 pm, and subsequently extinguished the fire.
12 The fire completely destroyed the inside of the house and the roof, and although photos show outside walls still standing with the roof caved in, the house has been deemed completely destroyed. The cost of replacement has been assessed at $168,000, although there has apparently been no action taken to reinstate it.
13 Before firefighters arrived, as I have said, you had left the property and were apparently given a lift by a friend and driven to your mother's house. Once there, you went and sat on the back deck without mentioning what had occurred. Soon afterwards, she began to receive calls and messages on her phone informing her that there was a fire at a house in your street, and people, including your sister, thought it might be yours. Your mother asked you about it and you acted surprised. She later told police that at that stage she'd asked you for a lighter, and you pulled one out of your backpack and at the same time you pulled out a big bottle of petrol and put it on the table, and she told you to get it away from her.
14 Your mother then drove you back to your house, which both of you saw was still on fire with emergency services, including police, present. You walked over to the police and were arrested. You were interviewed that day, and although you denied lighting the fire, you admitted various matters which were relevant and ultimately indicative that you had.
15 You were remanded that day, and have remained in custody ever since. Approximately six months of that time will count as pre-sentence detention towards the sentence I impose, and the other three months which were spent serving a different sentence are also relevant to the sentence I impose.
16 I must consider the seriousness of this offending, including what are called objective circumstances and also your personal circumstances, including your role. The maximum penalty of 15 years imprisonment reflects the seriousness of the offence of arson. Of course, arson can take many forms, and be at different levels of seriousness. In this case, the extent and value of the damage was considerable, although by no means as much as in many cases of arson and not as great as might have been had it spread to surrounding properties. It did not cause injury to any person. Although you would have known that no-one was inside the house and at risk in that manner, there was nevertheless risk to firefighters, or if the fire had spread to the neighbouring houses. I have seen from photos, and counsel confirm, that there is a sports reserve behind the backyard, so little risk of the fire spreading in that direction
17 I find that what you did was not carefully planned, and also that it was not for personal gain, except in the indirect sense of you not wanting to continue living in that house, but not for monetary gain. Indeed, you did not have contents insurance and will have suffered loss of personal items including those of your children, as well as loss of your home.
18 On the basis of evidence available to me, I am unable to find beyond reasonable doubt that you deliberately poured accelerant in the house with the aim of setting fire to it. I am also unable to find beyond reasonable doubt, as I would need to do, that when you asked to borrow a lighter from your neighbours you intended to set fire to the house. By your plea of guilty, you concede acting with the intention of damaging the property by fire, and that it was certainly not accidental. Your preceding actions that I have described – and some of your previous comments to your mother – lead me to find that it was not an instantaneous decision, but I make no finding as to precisely how long you had contemplated it, or when what might have been abstract contemplations and generalised talk may have become real intent to act.
19 I have read your record of your interview which indicates contradictory thinking by you, some of it chaotic thought processes, but also some I take to be deliberately evasive answers and even attempting teasing of police.
20 The fact that what you were destroying may have been a house you felt had many problems with it, and with which you had become frustrated, could not, of course, excuse your action in destroying it or trying to destroy it. It being public housing, there is no individual person who has suffered the monetary loss, but that is loss to a public body, ultimately to the people of Victoria, and it not only has taken away the home that you, and previously your children, were living in, but taken one piece of public housing, one house, out of availability for other people to use. I note that it has not been reinstated. I have no information as to whether there is alternative newer housing that has been built, but nothing to indicate that it has.
21 I take into account that you pleaded guilty to this charge. That occurred at the second committal mention on 10 October last year, which was some months after the event. I am told by your counsel that that delay was due to the time needed to resolve the assessed value of the property destroyed, which had originally been claimed by the Department to be higher.
22 Your plea of guilty entitles you to some leniency in your sentence, and I take it to have been made at a reasonably early opportunity. It is of practical and economic value to the community in saving the time and cost of disputed hearings, and also indicates that you have accepted responsibility for your actions. I take it also as some reflection of remorse, although perhaps not fulsome remorse, because fundamentally you seem to have continued to have felt wronged in relation to the condition of this house and the fact that it was being broken into.
23 I shall tell you when I have imposed sentence what the sentence would have been had you not pleaded guilty but been found guilty on this charge after a trial.
24 I turn now to your personal circumstances.
25 You are now aged 34 and were 33 at the time of this offence.
26 You have lived most of your life in Cobram. Your biological father left the family when you were very young and you have never had a relationship with him. Your mother subsequently re-partnered and your stepfather has treated you as his own child.
27 Your mother's father, I am told, was a Torres Strait Islander man – and you identify with that heritage. You did not apply to have your case heard in the County Koori Court. I make no comment about that one way or the other, but it was known to you to be possible. I have no information as to how this aspect of your identity and your heritage has affected your life overall. I am told of a close relationship with your mother.
28 Recently, you described to a psychologist having a stable and happy childhood, with hard working parents – your mother and stepfather – and your sister to whom you were close. However, it seems you struggled academically at school, which caused you to lose interest. Behavioural problems that developed led you to being asked to leave school when aged 15. I am told that you left with very low literacy skills and have never really developed further literacy. I am told that you first undertook an apprenticeship in baking, but when you turned 18 you went into the building industry as a bricklayer. You apparently worked relatively constantly for many years in that field, mainly as a contractor, until you became the sole custodial parent of your two very young children. That was in 2014, and apparently you have struggled with time commitments and those responsibilities to be able to gain or pursue much work.
29 I am told that you have a very longstanding history of substance abuse, starting with smoking cannabis from the age of 14, then experimenting with amphetamines for some years. You were also a heavy drinker of alcohol. You apparently ceased the use of the heavier drugs, but continued using cannabis and alcohol.
30 There is some information that after your children were born you significantly reduced your use of all drugs and alcohol, although you did continue to use cannabis and alcohol to relieve stress and symptoms of depression.
31 You were apparently diagnosed as suffering from episodic depression and anxiety some eight to 10 years ago. You were prescribed anti-depressants and for the last few years that has been Pristiq. However, you had stopped using this medication a month or so before this offending.
32 The report of Ms Miriam Latif, a psychologist who assessed you earlier this month, puts forward that alcohol is of course a known depressant and may have been diminishing the effectiveness of the anti-depressant you were taking. However, I have no way of determining whether that is likely. What is known is that you took a decision to stop taking the prescribed medication, but were continuing to use and abuse cannabis and alcohol, and that your mood and general mental health was deteriorating over this period. It is in this period that your children were not living with you directly; they were living with your mother. I note your mother's statement, which I accept as truthful, but obviously also a caring account as given to the police on the day, described you as having been struggling for a few weeks before this event.
33 You have a considerable criminal history, which I gather started in your teenage years. Your adult criminal record commenced in 2005 when you were not yet 20 years old, and you faced Shepparton Magistrates' Court for charges of burglary and theft, as well as using and possessing both cannabis and methylamphetamine. On that occasion you received a community based order for 12 months with conditions including drug and alcohol assessment and treatment, and medical and psychological assessment and treatment.
34 Your ongoing criminal record shows that with some interludes of maybe a year or so at a time, there were 10 further court appearances before the current offending, involving failure to comply with the initial CBO, including both by further burglaries and thefts, and being sentenced on that occasion to imprisonment but that to be served by an Intensive Correction Order.
35 In 2006, you were dealt with for failing to comply with an Intensive Correction Order, and ordered to serve the unexpired portion in prison, and at the same time you were dealt with for the breaching charges of intentionally damaging property, as well as recklessly causing injury and dishonesty offences. Nine months imprisonment was reinstated, and the other sentences were a head sentence with a non-parole period of nine months. There was a compensation order made of $120 on that occasion, which I take to be in respect of the charge of intentionally damaging property, but I have no further information about that actual offending.
36 In September 2008, you were fined for handling stolen goods and using and possessing drugs. In May 2009, you received a suspended sentence for cultivating cannabis, intentionally damaging property and driving offences. The following year you were dealt with for breaching the suspended sentence. You were next before a court in August 2012 for inciting resistance of police and behaving in a riotous manner, and for those offences you were fined.
37 In 2013, you were dealt with for a number of further offences of violence and criminal damage and drug use offences.
38 In December 2015 at Shepparton Magistrates' Court, you were sentenced to a Community Correction Order for theft and persistent contravention of a family violence notice. The conditions of the Community Correction Order included treatment and rehabilitation in respect of drug abuse. However, three months later you were back before the court for contravening that CCO. You were sentenced to three months imprisonment, with a custody management note indicating that you were withdrawing from drug addiction and had psychiatric illness, suffered from depression and anxiety, and were prescribed Seroquel and Lexapro. The original Community Correction Order was also varied to commence on your release from that term of imprisonment, and included treatment and rehabilitation conditions for drug abuse, mental health assessment, and offending behaviour programs, with reference to a report of Forensicare. I am told that you did ultimately satisfactorily complete that CCO.
39 Your prior criminal history indicates that you have engaged in drug-related offending over many years, with acts of dishonesty, and of violence including damaging property. Your record also indicates that, despite being given several opportunities on community-based remedial sentencing orders, you have each time reverted to drug abuse and further offending with it. This means that far from coming before the court as a first time offender, the court takes into account what has been tried and failed, and it could be said that the nature of the offending that brings you before me has escalated.
40 I asked through your counsel whether you had undergone drug rehabilitation programs and was told that you did so initially on the CBO but not since. You have not so far sought to undertake any such programs whilst in custody.
41 It is clear that you have been assessed previously as suffering from mental health problems, were noted to be prescribed anti-depressant medication, and yet you have not apparently undergone active treatment through counselling for your depression or anxiety. That, as well as the drug addictions, are areas which seem to me clearly to call for you seeking out or accepting help through various programs or treatments to assist you to cope better in the future than you have each time after previous offending or previous sentences.
42
Further, although not strictly a prior criminal conviction, you have appeared subsequently – that is subsequently to this arson offence – before a court on
10 October last year, when you were dealt with for offending which occurred before the current offending. I am told that in November 2018you committed an assault and criminal damage, and these involved an incident with your then girlfriend who had been living in the house in Denise Road, Cobram, with you and your children. Apparently, in a heated argument with her, you struck her and that was the subject of a charge of assault. Apparently, you also destroyed some of her property, namely, clothing and shoes. Your counsel described these items as having been thrown out of the house. However, I was told by the prosecution that the police summary indicates that you burnt them in the backyard, or burnt the shirts in the backyard. Although that did not give rise to a charge of arson, but rather of criminal damage, it is of some concern that you used fire as a means of damaging those items. That was some months before the incident that I am dealing with, but seems to me to have been a somewhat ominous forerunner to the charge of setting fire to the house.
43 In the circumstances, I do not take this to have been a prior offence of arson, and you certainly do not fall to be sentenced as a serious arson offender. However, it was behaviour which with hindsight was ominous, and I also note that you have spoken of destruction of the house by fire both in the context of what you allege a neighbour threatened to do, to harm your children, and also in the context of what you had said to your mother, whether out of frustration and abstract thinking I am unable to say. The psychological report that has been provided does not seem to me to comment on whether there is any ongoing risk of you resorting to use of fire again, and I can make no finding as to any such risk, but I have noted that I have some concern with that history.
44 I have already mentioned that you have two children, one aged seven and one aged five. The elder, I am told, has had behavioural problems which had heightened before this incident, but I am told, and your mother confirmed in a letter, that he has improved since a change of medication.
45 I am told that in 2014, when your children were only three and one respectively, the Department of Health and Human Services took action to remove them from their mother, your former partner, and to place them in your sole custody. You were living with your mother at the time, and I am sure that she was of great assistance in looking after them, especially given their extremely young ages at the time. However, I note that she works part time, and your stepfather's work as a truck driver keeps him away from home a lot. I take it that you had a considerable role in caring for them from that time onwards. I am sure that the responsibility of looking after two such young children would have been very considerable, and, further, that when you moved with them into the house in December 2017, the burden of time and responsibility for looking after them, and a household, on your own, would have imposed very considerable extra stress on you. It may be that you never coped with that from the time of moving into the house. You certainly expressed frustrations with the house from the start.
46 It also seems that you had a difficult break up of a relationship, as I have said, giving rise to some offences that apparently occurred in November 2018. Those charges from that break up were heard in the Magistrates Court in October last year, and resulted in you being sentenced to three months imprisonment. I have already mentioned the actual offences. The fact that some of your recent time in custody was spent in serving that sentence, means that it is not strictly to be counted as part of the pre-sentence detention for the current matter. I do take it into account as part of the overall time you will have been in custody, in conjunction with the sentence I am imposing today. What is called the principle of totality requires me to moderate the overall sentence I impose to take into account the totality of time you will be in custody, for the totality of offending to which it relates. I think it likely that there would have been considerable cumulation and only modest concurrency from that incident with the incident for which I am sentencing you had the two been determined at about the same time.
47 Turning back to the report of Ms Latif, she diagnosed you as suffering substance abuse disorders in relation to both cannabis and alcohol. She clearly thought that your prolonged history of substance abuse, mainly of cannabis and alcohol, has been of significance. Those conditions do not entitle you to any leniency in your sentence, although they confirm that those are long time underlying problems for you, and put some of your behaviour in context. Ms Latif also diagnosed a major depressive disorder and generalised anxiety disorder. The depression, she felt, seems to have been more episodic, although not entirely, and she considers led to you feeling not only of low mood and lacking in energy, but angry and irritable, feeling worthless, hopeless and helpless. She opines that your depression made your anger and frustration about the situation in relation to your safety and your house more difficult to control, and that the depression also influenced your behaviour and decision making. However, she says it did not impact your ability to understand right from wrong, nor to understand the consequences of your actions.
48 Your counsel, Ms Fallar, relies on principles from a case called Verdins[1] in submitting that this opinion supports a finding that there was an underlying psychological condition which contributed to your offending by influencing your behaviour and decision making. That would enliven principles that require me to consider whether your moral responsibility, what is called moral culpability, was lower than for someone without that condition, and also if it affected your thought processes in relation to the offending, it would also require me to consider whether that condition makes your case less suitable to be used for what is called general deterrence – that is, as an example to others of the type of sentence they might expect if they engage in similar offending to yours. It was not seriously put forward that the condition is of a nature that it means I should not take into account specific deterrence, meaning that one of the purposes of the sentence, given your long criminal history, should be to discourage you from further offending.
[1]R v Verdins [2007] 16 VR 269
49 The prosecution argues that the connection or nexus between the condition that has been diagnosed and the offending is not really established by the opinion of Ms Latif, as she explains it, and therefore does not enliven consideration of reduction in the sentence on any of those bases.Based on Ms Latif's report, I note that you are now again taking prescribed anti-depressant medication, and there is no indication that you are finding imprisonment more onerous than for a person not suffering from your underlying psychological condition, so considerations under another of the principles from Verdins[2] case do not seem to be established.
[2]R v Verdins [2007] 16 VR 269
50 I have taken into account the submissions of both counsel in relation to this issue. I am satisfied that Ms Latif's report does provide sufficient support as an evidentiary basis for a finding of a nexus between your longstanding underlying depressive condition contributing to your offending conduct. However, I am not satisfied that it was a major contributor to your decision making, and I am not satisfied that it overwhelmed what were also very significant influences of the after effects of the drug you had taken – the cannabis.
51 I have moderated the sentence a little to take into account that your offending occurred at a time when you were stressed and felt overwhelmed by your circumstances, and were probably not thinking very clearly. Your ability to reason sensibly was also clouded by the depressive after effects of alcohol and cannabis. However, you chose to use those substances. Their effect is no excuse, and nor is your decision to cease to take prescribed anti-depressant medication. Those do put into context that your reasoning was probably clouded and your mood unstable at the time, and as I have said, to a modest degree I have moderated the sentence because there is an underlying depressive condition that I find made a contribution to clouding your mood and judgment at the time.
52 There are some positive features which give hope for your being able to build a more stable life after your release. However, given your long criminal history and long history with drug abuse and only moderately treated underlying depressive condition, I consider that your prospects of rehabilitation are somewhat guarded.
53 I am told that in custody you are now a cleaning billet, and I take that to reflect that you have been willing to work and have been recognised by the prison authorities as being responsible enough to be in charge of some other prisoners in that work. That does reflect good and diligent behaviour by you.
54 Next, and importantly in my view, it is clear that your mother and stepfather are ongoing positive support figures for you. Their combined letter expresses their ongoing support for you. However, I note that you will not be able to live with them if using drugs.
55 Your children are still very young. They are currently, as I have said, living with their grandparents with approval of DHHS while you are in custody. I am satisfied not only that they are in good care there, but that you are confident that they are safe and in good care while you are in prison, and that is of some comfort for you. However, they are formally in your sole custody and I assume you want that to continue. If it is to continue, there are many, many years ahead in which you will have very significant responsibilities towards them. That the older child has a history of behavioural problems has no doubt been an extra difficulty for you to handle, and that will no doubt require ongoing attention and attendance on doctors and other consultants. The role of parenting children carries great responsibility and great satisfaction. You will need to address your own underlying problems to help you cope with that.
56 You need, in my view, to address your substance abuse and mood disorders. It would help if you commence that whilst in custody, but certainly when you leave custody in order to properly commit to looking after your children, and to build a stable and hopefully happy life for you and them in the future. I do note that to your credit you describe your own childhood as happy and supportive, and hopefully you will see your way to providing that for your own children for the future. Hopefully, your children will be a significant motivation for you doing so.
57 The most important sentencing purposes in this case, in my view, are denunciation of the conduct and general and specific deterrence. The sentence must show the community generally and you personally that this type of conduct will receive stern punishment. As I have already explained, I do not regard it as anywhere near the most serious range of offences of this nature, but it was still significant.
58 I am obliged to take into account, to the extent possible, current sentencing practice. When I say to the extent possible, I mean to the extent that it can be determined, and you have heard me debate with counsel that it is difficult to find cases of sufficient similarity to gauge what that sentencing practice is. Both the prosecutor and your counsel referred to some decisions in cases involving charges of arson, but both also submitted that there were significant differences in the circumstances in those cases.
59 I have today noted two cases of sentences handed down this week by other judges of this court for arson of residential properties, however, the circumstances of those offenders and of the offences themselves also differed from yours, although there were some similarities. In each of those cases there were additional offences that puts the context of each individual sentence in the matter of Burt[3] in a different context. The charge of arson in the matter of Zonnerfeldt[4] was part of an aggregate sentence and also was imposed on a person who was found to have been in a psychotic state at the time of offending, from which I gather that much more moderation, due to principles in Verdins[5] case, would have been applied than is warranted in your case. I also referred counsel to a case which I dealt with some years ago known as DPP v Garrison[6], although that was a pseudonym, in which a quite modest period of imprisonment followed by a CCO was imposed. In that case, the main similarity was of a person setting fire to a DHHS house of which he was tenant, however, there were other personal circumstances making it somewhat different from yours.
[3]DPP v Burt (January 2020, unreported)
[4]DPP v Zonnerfeldt (January 2020, unreported)
[5]R v Verdins [2007] 16 VR 269
[6]DPP v Garrison (a pseudonym) [2016] VCC 311
60 I do not consider that your sentence should be as high as those brought to my attention by counsel, but I do consider you should be required to serve a considerable further period of imprisonment for this offence than the period you have served so far.
61 There was to be put a submission about a potential sentence of imprisonment followed by a CCO, but that was not pursued, and you have sought to have me impose either a straight sentence or one with a non-parole period set. It is my view that the appropriate sentence requires a head sentence in a range that requires a non-parole period to be set. Also, in my view, it is appropriate in your circumstances, and in the interests of both you personally and the community, that when you are released from prison there be some supervision, and that will be by way of parole. Hopefully, there will also be able to be some services or programs put in place that may assist you on your release in your rehabilitation, and to re-adjust into the community. Further, in my view very importantly, hopefully, there will be able to be some programs and services put in place to assist you to take back the care and custody of your children.
62 Would you stand up now, please.
63
Troy Rowley, on the charge of arson you are convicted and sentenced to imprisonment for 32 months – that is two years and eight months. I set a
non-parole period of 19 months – that is one year and seven months. It is of course up to the Parole Board to decide whether you will be released at the earliest possible date. I declare 179 days pre-sentence detention in respect of this offence as reckoned served. That will be deducted administratively, but it means that both the head sentence and non-parole period will have that time credited. So, in practical terms, your earliest parole date, on my calculation, will be in approximately 13 months' time from now.
64
I state, for the purposes of s.6AAA of the Sentencing Act, that if you had not pleaded guilty but had been found guilty of this offence after a trial, I would have imposed a sentence of four years and three months imprisonment, with a
non-parole period of three years.
65
There is a Disposal Order that was sought and not opposed, and I make that disposal order. Take a seat for a moment,
Mr Rowley while the orders are finalised.
66 HER HONOUR: Have I overlooked anything?
67 MS FALLAR: Your Honour, just to assist in relation to 2013 offending, I looked at that. The sentence he received was an adjourned undertaking of one year.
68 HER HONOUR: All right. Was that breached or fulfilled? Maybe he got through that time because I think it was two years later the next one. I had looked through step by step. I obviously skipped something in my summarising. Thank you. I have signed the disposal order already and a copy can be made available for both sides. I am aware of the time. It is Friday afternoon and I want to get the order finalised as soon as possible so I will just stay on the Bench to do that. So it will be in order if Mr Rowley is removed from the court room.
69 Do you want a chance to speak to him while he is still here or will you go downstairs?
70 MS FALLAR: I will go downstairs, Your Honour.
71
HER HONOUR: I am watching the time. It might be best if Mr Rowley is removed from the court now so he can be taken downstairs and then you can leave and see him, Ms Fallar. Mr Rowley, as I say, the head sentence is
32 months, the non-parole period 19 months of which just under six months has been declared as reckoned served. I will ask that Mr Rowley be removed from the court, please. I have some of the orders so it can be processed. I am just conscious that Friday afternoon it is important to do it promptly or Mr Rowley gets caught up in the system and it becomes more and more difficult to transport him.
- - -
1
0