Director of Public Prosecutions v Sullivan, Zapanta Jane
[2014] VCC 1367
•26 August 2014
| IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA | Revised Not Restricted Suitable for Publication |
AT MELBOURNE
CRIMINAL DIVISION
Case No. CR-14-00149
| DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS |
| v |
| Zapanta Jane SULLIVAN |
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JUDGE: | His Honour Chief Judge Rozenes | |
WHERE HELD: | Melbourne | |
DATE OF HEARING: | 18 August 2014 | |
DATE OF SENTENCE: | 26 August 2014 | |
CASE MAY BE CITED AS: | DPP v SULLIVAN, Zapanta Jane | |
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION: | [2014] VCC 1367 | |
REASONS FOR SENTENCE
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Catchwords: CRIMINAL LAW – sentencing – obtain financial advantage by deception – relevant prior criminal history – considerable quantum of offending – compelling personal circumstances – term of imprisonment warranted – shorter than usual non-parole period.
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APPEARANCES: | Counsel | Solicitors |
| For the DPP | Mr D. Hannan | Office of Public Prosecutions |
| For the Accused | Mr P. Monagle | Peter Monagle Lawyers |
HIS HONOUR:
1 Zapanta Jane Sullivan, you have pleaded guilty to four charges of obtaining a financial advantage by deception. The offending occurred between October and November 2012. You admitted your criminal history, which included four court appearances between 10 July 2008 and 27 March 2013. Your criminal history contains relevant prior convictions for this sentencing exercise. I was told by your counsel that you appeared at Dandenong Magistrates’ Court on 22 May 2014 on a consolidated plea of guilty to a number of deception and drug offences, as well as a breach of suspended sentence, and received a total effective sentence of 6 months’ imprisonment. You have further deception charges pending, listed for plea hearing at Melbourne Magistrates’ Court today, 26 August 2014. I thought it would have been of some benefit if those charges could be brought to this court, but that cannot occur. Accordingly I pay no heed to those matters.
2 Each of the charges of obtaining a financial advantage by deception carries a maximum penalty of 10 years’ imprisonment. The facts of the case were opened by Mr Hannan and are contained in the Summary of Prosecution Opening, Exhibit A in these proceedings.
3 In brief summary, on 8 June 2012 you opened an Access Advantage Cheque Account with the ANZ Bank in your name. On 17 August 2012 you opened a Small Business Savings and Cheque Account, again with the ANZ, in your name. On 13 September 2012, your application for an ANZ credit card was granted, with a limit of $5,000.00. All three accounts were linked. Within two days of activating the credit card, it was at its limit. Between 19 October and 26 October 2012, you wrote four bad cheques of various amounts and presented them at ANZ branches for payment into your credit card account. On each occasion you withdrew the money from your credit card before the cheques were dishonoured. This offending forms the basis of Charge 1. You similarly withdrew funds arising from bad cheques on 29 October and 2 November 2012; one for $70,000.00 (Charge 2) and one for $99,392.72 (Charge 3). On 8 November 2012, you presented two cheques you had written out to yourself in the amounts of $38,965.00 and $45,860.00. These cheques had been stolen from a car on 3 November 2012. The bank cancelled the cheques before the funds could be accessed. This was the basis of Charge 4. The total value of the cheques presented to ANZ Bank for deposit into your credit card account was $310,485.62. As a result of your fraudulent activities, the bank has incurred a loss of $79,921.95. You were interviewed by police on 23 May 2013 and made full admissions to the offending. You admitted spending the money on overseas trips, jewellery, hair products, electrical and computer goods, perfume and household goods.
4 Mr Monagle appeared on your behalf. He tendered written submissions, Exhibit 1; a report of Jeffrey Cummins, forensic psychologist, dated 15 August 2014, Exhibit 2; a letter written by you, Exhibit 3; a bundle of Department of Justice documents, Exhibit 4; and medical records/reports, Exhibit 5. You were born in the Philippines and are currently aged 31 years. Your mother abandoned you when you were aged 5 and you were raised by your father to the age of 15-and-a-half, when your father sent you to Queensland to live with your mother. Your father died of liver cancer in 2011. You are estranged from your family and have no contact with your half-siblings, who reside in Queensland. You were educated both in the Philippines and here and completed Year 12 at a secondary school in Queensland. You worked for three months as a housekeeper on Hamilton Island before working in a number of hospitality positions in Queensland. You then relocated to Melbourne, where you worked as a massage therapist for 18 months. You were in a relationship from the age of 21 and gave birth to your son Aidan in 2005. Sadly, Aidan died at age 18 months of bronchial pneumonia. After Aidan’s death, you separated from Aidan’s father and moved to Townsville, where you worked as a youth worker and a pizza deliverer, then as a chef. After six months you returned to Melbourne and worked in various call centres. You formed a new relationship and had your second child, Bryce, who is currently aged 5. Your partner took your son to the Philippines in September 2012 and has not returned. You have not seen Bryce since that time. You formed a relationship with a man 18 years your senior and, in the context of that relationship, were introduced to crystal methylamphetamine. You quickly developed a daily habit and have admitted using methylamphetamine at the time of this offending.
5 You have had a tragic life: your mother abandoned you at 5; between the ages of 7 and 12, you were sexually abused by your stepmother’s brother; your first child died in infancy; your father in 2011; and, your second child has been removed by his father. In his report, Exhibit 2, Jeffrey Cummins diagnosed you with Complex Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, Persistent Depressive Disorder and Persistent Complex Bereavement Disorder. He noted that you are currently prescribed an antidepressant. Whilst he said that it is quite probable that you were under the adverse influence of others who were supplying you with crystal methylamphetamine, upon which you had a psychological dependence, he did not suggest that otherwise your mental health issues were directly connected to your offending. However, he did refer in his report to an earlier assessment he made with respect to earlier offending that, at that time, your perception, judgement and problem solving ability were compromised because of your mental health problems.
6 Mr Cummins was of the opinion that you require ongoing and intensive mental health treatment and states that his prognosis of you is guarded; unless you receive the necessary treatment, your mental health whilst in the community would deteriorate. He said you were benefiting from receiving psychological treatment and a number of courses in custody.
7 In the letter you wrote to the Court, Exhibit 3, you express remorse at your actions and gave further insight into the tragic circumstances of your life. You describe your involvement in bikie gangs and the triads and your descent into drug use and offending.
8 On your behalf, Mr Monagle submitted that I take into account the following matters by way of mitigation:
(a) You were using methylamphetamine and associating with a serious criminal element at the time of the offending;
(b) You have now been diagnosed with a number of mental illnesses that have arisen predominantly as a result of your upbringing;
(c) You are now prescribed antidepressant medication and have been seeing a counsellor whilst in prison; and
(d) Verdins principles apply, given your diagnosis of mental illness. He said that general and specific deterrence should be moderated given your conditions and that a sentence of imprisonment would weigh more heavily on you.
9 As I have said, Mr Cummins in his report (Exhibit 2) does not attempt to establish a nexus between the offending and your diagnoses. Nor does he say that imprisonment would weigh more heavily on you than it would on a person in normal health or that there is a serious risk of imprisonment having a significant adverse effect on your mental health. It is, nevertheless, clear that you have now, and had at the time of offending, a number of mental health issues in addition to an addiction to drugs. Further, you had a substantially compromised childhood. I intend to take each of these matters into account in your favour.
10 As I have already said, during your period on remand for this offending you were sentenced by the Magistrates’ Court to a total effective sentence of 6 months and pre-sentence detention allocated to that sentence. That sentence was imposed for like offending committed at roughly the same time as the present offences. The principle of totality requires that I take your recent imprisonment into account and I do so.
11 The basic purposes for which a court may impose a sentence are punishment, deterrence (both specific and general), rehabilitation, denunciation, and protection of the community. In sentencing, I must have regard to a range of matters such as the seriousness of the offence, your culpability for it, your personal circumstances and those of the victim if any. I am required to balance the interests of the community in denouncing criminal conduct with the interests of the community in seeking to ensure that, as far as possible, offenders are rehabilitated and reintegrated into society.
12 Your offending was relatively sophisticated and repetitive. It involved substantial rewards. It appears that you were able to exploit a weakness in the bank’s protocols which would normally apply to prevent offences such as yours. How this came about remains a mystery. There was a suggestion by your counsel, although it was not pursued to any extent that would permit me to be satisfied to any useful degree, that others were involved. There was a hint of it in your record of interview, and a complaint made to Mr Cummins (see Exhibit 2), but nothing in the letter you wrote to me, Exhibit 3. Mr Monagle specifically indicated that he did not intend to take this matter any further. Whether you were assisted by others and, if so, in what circumstances remains unclear and, for all intents and purposes, now somewhat irrelevant. The offending is serious and it was conceded by Mr Monagle that it deserved the imposition of an immediate custodial sentence.
13 Although, your sentence is less severe than I would have imposed had you pleaded not guilty. I accept your counsel’s submission that I should regard your plea as reflecting your early indication of a willingness to plead guilty. Your plea saves time, expense and the need for witnesses to give evidence and is reflective of some remorse.
14 I am satisfied that your offending is sufficiently of the same or similar character to warrant the imposition of an aggregate sentence, pursuant to s 9 of the Sentencing Act 1991, and I intend to do so.
15 Ms Sullivan, please stand. On all charges you are convicted and sentenced to an aggregate term of imprisonment of 15 months and I direct that you serve a minimum of 9 months before being eligible for parole.
16 I declare that 70 days of pre-sentence detention be reckoned as having been served under the sentence, and I direct that a declaration to that effect be recorded in the records of the court.
17 Section 6AAA of the Sentencing Act requires me to state the total effective sentence and the non-parole period I would have imposed had you pleaded not guilty and been convicted. Had you been convicted after a trial, I would have sentenced you to 2 years’ imprisonment with a non-parole period of 16 months.
18 Is there anything else?
19 COUNSEL: No, Your Honour.
20 HIS HONOUR: Thank you. Remove the prisoner.
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