Director of Public Prosecutions v Taylor, Shaun Michael
[2013] VCC 433
•8 April 2013
| IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA | Revised (Not) Restricted Suitable for Publication |
AT MELBOURNE
CRIMINAL DIVISION
Case No. CR-13-00059
| DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS |
| v |
| SHAUN MICHAEL TAYLOR |
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JUDGE: | HIS HONOUR JUDGE SMALLWOOD | |
WHERE HELD: | Melbourne | |
DATE OF HEARING: | ||
DATE OF SENTENCE: | 8 April 2013 | |
CASE MAY BE CITED AS: | DPP v Taylor, Shaun Michael | |
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION: | [2013] VCC 433 | |
REASONS FOR SENTENCE
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APPEARANCES: | Counsel | Solicitors |
| For the DPP | Ms K Argiropoulos | Office of Public Prosecutions |
| For the Accused | Ms L Mendicino |
HIS HONOUR:
1 Shaun Michael Taylor, you have pleaded guilty to 13 counts of obtaining financial advantage by deception, one count of theft and one count of unlawful interference with a surveillance device. Those crimes carry maximum penalties of ten years, ten years and two years respectively.
2 You are 46 years of age. You have matters from some seven years ago involving assault. That is of no significance here. Other than that you have no prior convictions and I am informed have no subsequent convictions of any significance. You pleaded guilty at the earliest reasonable opportunity although you made no comment answers to police which, of course, you are perfectly entitled to do.
3 I am, in the situation as indicated to your counsel, prepared to give you the benefit of the doubt insofar as remorse is concerned and there certainly is a significant utilitarian benefit which must come from that plea. Trials such as this are often complicated in running and take time and involve many witnesses. In your particular situation I assume that witnesses would have been brought from interstate and the like. As I have said the benefit to you must be significant.
4 Also there has been a significant delay in the proceeding. You were first suspected something like 18 months before you were arrested but the matter was not investigated because you were a person of interest, to use a neutral term, in respect of another matter which I will refer to in a moment. The offending ceased approximately four years ago now and obviously you have displayed in that time a capacity to rehabilitate and I take the delay of 18 months as well as the fact that you have not offended in that four year period very much into account on your behalf.
5 The nature of the offending is as follows and I will deal with it in as brief compass as I can and direct that the Crown opening be annexed to these, my sentencing remarks. The charge of theft involves you attending a property in May 2007 of a cousin. You gained access to a horse float on that property and in that horse float was a galvanised tool box in which there was stored three firearms. Namely two Marlin .22 rifles and a .308 Sauer signed rifle. You stole the three firearms. You were heard on intercepts talking to an associate, a Mr Mark Perry, both before and after the theft and you apparently gave him the firearms.
6 In October 2007 Mr Perry provided the firearms to a Nicholas Anstee, who apparently gave one to a Mr Gibson. They then, as I understand it, endeavoured to register the firearms. So at this point that to target for a theft, firearms, and to then provide them to others is a very risky business indeed. It is not suggested here that the firearms were used in any offending but the risk involved is obviously great. It is not often that the target matter of a theft is of significance but here I think it really is.
7 The obtaining financial advantage by deception can be described, in effect, as a modus operandi. I have given the matter consideration. I do not think it is an appropriate to give an aggregate sentence although I see very little reason for differentiating between the bulk of those 13 charges.
8 Effectively what you would do would be to obtain on credit cards or loan facilities by the production of false documentation, including at one stage a forged driver's licence. You had changed your name apparently by Deed poll on a couple of occasions however whether that was for the purpose of this offending I do not know. You would obtain the loan sometimes, at least on one occasion paying back an earlier loan and the sum involved in the end was very significant indeed.
9 I sentence you for the crimes as they relate to the credit limits that you obtained except for the Count 9 which relates to a motor vehicle and was a loan of $91,000. None of which has been paid as I understand it. The vehicle cannot be found and you have not provided any details as to where it is. It seems to me in this particular situation that that particular count of dishonesty stands alone amongst the dozen or so. I treat it as a series of events over a period of approximately two and a half years and a succession of calculated dishonesties. The offending and the nature of the frauds such as this has to be regarded as serious.
10 The last charge of tampering, I suppose is the appropriate term, with a surveillance device is, I think, of little significance. In the ordinary course of events I doubt it would have come into this jurisdiction. You apparently found a tracking device on your car and took it to a shop which sold surveillance gear to find out what it was. If, as your counsel said you removed it from your vehicle thinking it might be a bomb, you are a very brave man indeed. Be that as it may
11 The situation is that an active custodial sentence is inevitable and it must be one of significant proportions. Offending such as this, certainly so far as the first 14 counts are concerned, involves the application of general and specific deterrence as well as denunciation and appropriate punishment.
12 I then look to matters personal to you in terms of the duration of that sentence. You have, through your counsel, declined to provide any information, really, about your background or in one sense I suppose who you even are. That is entirely a matter for you and it does not, in any way, aggravate the situation. What it does mean is that you are sentenced, in one sense, in a vacuum.
13 The overall situation is that since around 2007 when the theft of the guns took place the police have been, I accept, persisting in endeavouring to obtain the whereabouts of one Mark Adrian Perry from you . Mark Adrian Perry, as I understand it, is a suspect and has been for some time in the murder of one Shane Chartres-Abbott in 2003. I am aware that certainly at least one person has been convicted of that murder and another is to stand trial. You have maintained, I am told, that you have no idea of the whereabouts of Perry and it is clear from the material before me that you have been under surveillance in that respect for a very significant period of time.
14 What has been described to me from the Bar table is that that surveillance has not appeared to have been transitory and it certainly has been taken seriously. This offending would appear to have occurred in the course of such surveillance but other than that I do not know quite what I am supposed to do with all that. Circumstances existed where your picture or photograph was exhibited publicly in relation to changes to the LEAP database and I accept that you have suffered a degree of anxiety and stress as a result of that.
15 That is about all I know about you, Mr Taylor, and that is all a matter for you. I think that it is pretty clear from the materials and your associations and the nature of the thefts that you are a man who knows what he is about. So I simply sentence you for what you have done and not what you might have done or whatever.
16 The prospects of your rehabilitation are somewhat theoretical. I note though that at the age of 46 have no relevant prior convictions and have now gone for four years without any subsequent offending. That means that you should be able to rehabilitate and the risk of you re-offending should be relatively low.
17 I take into the account the principles of totality. As I have indicated I do not propose to give an aggregate sentence but it is a bit academic to be trying to distinguish between these charges too much. However in the circumstances I think that I should give individual sentence for each charge and then accumulate with a great deal of moderation because of the principles of totality.
18 Accordingly one Charge 1 of theft, an unusual theft I might say, ten months. On Charge 2, seven days. On Charge 3, six months. On Charge 4, six months. On Charge 5, six months. On Charge 6, six months. Charge 7, six months, Charge 8, six months, Charge 9, the one involving $91,000 15 months. Charge 10, six months, Charge 11, six months, Charge 12, six months, Charge 13, six months, Charge 14, nine months that one being involving in the excess of $50,000 and Charge 15 seven days.
19 I direct that four months of the sentence imposed on Count 1, one month of the sentence imposed on Count 3, one month of the sentence imposed on Count 4, one month of the sentence imposed on Count 5, one month of the sentence imposed on Count 6, one month of the sentence imposed on Continue 7, two months of the sentence imposed on Count 8, two months of the sentence imposed on Count 10, one month of the sentence imposed on Count 11, two months of the sentence imposed on Count 12, two months of the sentence imposed on Count 13 and three months of the sentence imposed on Count 14 be served cumulatively upon each other and upon the sentence imposed on Count 9. That gives an effective head sentence of 36 months.
20 I direct that 16 months be suspended for a period of three years. That I consider it in the interests of justice to do so which leaves a term to be served of 20 months. I direct that 222 days be reckoned as having been served under this sentence. Pursuant to s.6AAA of the Sentencing Act I say that but for your plea of guilty you would have been sentenced for a period of four years with a minimum term of three.
21 Now just do the arithmetic for me, ladies, if you would. I am sure it is right but just to make sure.
22 MS MENDICINO: Sorry, Your Honour, I missed the total effective sentence.
23 HIS HONOUR: Thirty-six.
24 MS MENDICINO: Thirty-six.
25 MS ARGIROPOULOS: That all adds up correctly, Your Honour.
26 HIS HONOUR: Yes. Yes, Ms Mendicino, are you all right with that?
27 MS MENDICINO: Yes, Your Honour.
28 HIS HONOUR: All right, there's no other orders I have to make?
29 MS MENDICINO: No.
30 HIS HONOUR: All right. I don't warn him, do I, with a partially suspended; It's only a wholly? I'll just say something. There is a partially suspended sentence there, Mr Taylor. Once they let you go understand you can breach that by any sort of offending involving a gaol sentence, like a drunk and disorderly can do it technically.
31 PRISONER: Yep.
32 HIS HONOUR: So if you breach it, the odds are you are going to do it again particularly if you breached anything to do with guns or thieving. All right?
33 PRISONER: Yep.
34 HIS HONOUR: All right.
35 MS MENDICINO: As Your Honour pleases.
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