Fall v Vuolo
[2022] ACTSC 249
SUPREME COURT OF THE AUSTRALIAN CAPITAL TERRITORY
Case Title: | Fall v Vuolo |
Citation: | [2022] ACTSC 249 |
Hearing Date: | 24 August 2022 |
DecisionDate: | 15 September 2022 |
Before: | Kennett J |
Decision: | See [40] |
Catchwords: | CRIMINAL LAW – APPEAL – Appeal from ACT Magistrates Court – appeal against sentence – stalking – where conviction was not recorded – whether Magistrate erred in finding offending was at the lowest level of objective seriousness – whether Magistrate erred in finding that there was extra-curial punishment – whether sentence imposed was manifestly inadequate – appeal allowed on the ground of manifest inadequacy and conviction recorded |
Legislation Cited: | Crimes (Sentence Administration) Act 2005 (ACT) Crimes (Sentencing) Act 2005 (ACT) s 17, 33 Magistrates Court Act 1930 (ACT) ss 219B, 219D, 219F |
Cases Cited: | Amberger v Stagg [2019] ACTMC 26 Bennet v Daley [2021] ACTSC 159 Wong v The Queen [2001] HCA 64; 207 CLR 584 |
Parties: | Nicholas Fall ( Appellant) Teijo Tapani Vuolo ( Respondent) |
Representation: | Counsel R Christensen SC ( Appellant) F J Purnell SC ( Respondent) |
| Solicitors ACT Director of Public Prosecutions ( Appellant) Aulich Criminal Law ( Respondent) | |
File Number: | SCA 13 of 2022 |
Decision under appeal: | Court/Tribunal: Magistrates Court of the ACT Before: Magistrate Theakston Date of Decision: 20 April 2022 Case Title: Fall v Vuolo Court File Number: CC2020/14257 |
KENNETT J:
Following a trial in the Magistrates Court, the respondent was found guilty on a charge of stalking under s 35 of the Crimes Act 1900 (ACT) (Crimes Act). After a further hearing on sentence, on 20 April 2022 the Magistrate made a non-conviction order under s 17(2)(b) of the Crimes (Sentencing) Act 2005 (ACT) (Sentencing Act) and imposed a good behaviour order for a period of 12 months.
The informant (the appellant) appeals from these orders. The grounds of appeal (as amended) are as follows:
(a)The sentencing magistrate erred in finding the offending was at “the lowest level of objective seriousness”;
(b) The sentencing magistrate erred in finding that there was extra-curial punishment; and
(c) The sentence imposed was manifestly inadequate.
The appeal is brought pursuant to s 219B(1)(f) of the Magistrates Court Act 1930 (ACT) (Magistrates Court Act) and is thus a “review appeal” for the purposes of Division 3.10.3 of that Act. Section 219D sets out the permissible grounds of such an appeal and it is uncontroversial that the grounds advanced by the appellant are within the scope of s 219D(e). Under s 219F(1) this Court may dismiss the appeal (if satisfied that the decision below should be confirmed) or “set aside or quash, in whole or in part, or otherwise vary or amend” that decision. If the Court decides to set aside or vary the decision below in a case reliant on s 219D(e), s 219F(2)(c) provides that the Court may impose the sentence or penalty it considers appropriate. It is also uncontroversial that, in the light of these provisions, the appeal is not a hearing de novo. The appellant needs to establish error in the House v The King (1936) 55 CLR 499 sense, either by identifying a specific error of principle or by demonstrating that the sentence is manifestly inadequate.
The facts found by the Magistrate in finding the respondent guilty were, briefly, as follows:
(a)The respondent and the victim, [redacted], were married between 2010 and 2017.
(b)There are three children of their union who, at the time of the offending, were aged 10, seven and four.
(c)Around June 2018, the respondent and [redacted]commenced an informal arrangement for shared custody of the children. This involved a handover every two days at around 5:45 PM at a car park in Gold Creek, ACT. The children would arrive in the car belonging to the parent with whom they had been spending time, walk to the other parent’s car, and leave in that vehicle.
(d)On six occasions between 4 February and 14 May 2020, following handover of the children, the respondent either followed [redacted] in his car as she drove away or was ahead of her and backtracked to be behind her. On some of these occasions, the children were in [redacted]’s car; on others they were with the respondent in his car. Sometimes [redacted] was driving to her home and sometimes to her new partner’s home. On each occasion the respondent followed [redacted] through several turns on a route inconsistent with the shortest route to his own home.
(e)On each occasion, [redacted] recognised the respondent’s car and observed him in it. She took various kinds of evasive action. She felt fearful and harassed on these occasions.
(f)The Magistrate found that the respondent was at least reckless as to whether this behaviour would cause apprehension or fear of harm on the part of [redacted].
Ground (a)
The Magistrate found that the offending “must fall very much towards the lowest level of objective seriousness”. The appellant submits that this characterisation of the objective seriousness of the offending involved error, and that this contributed to the miscarriage of justice involved in the sentencing decision.
The Magistrate referred to what he described as “key features” of the offending in connection with his conclusion as to objective seriousness. First, he noted that he had not been able to make a finding that the respondent intended to cause apprehension or fear of harm. He then noted that there was no suggestion of any direct threat or violence and very little evidence that the respondent had looked directly into the eyes of [redacted]. He observed that there was no suggestion of intentional intimidation.
Despite these features, his Honour’s description of the offending as “very much towards the lowest level of objective seriousness” is surprising. The offending took place on six discrete occasions over a period of three months. It involved sustained conduct, sufficiently concerning to prompt evasive action by [redacted]. Although there is no suggestion of dangerous driving, the offending involved use of a motor vehicle for an improper purpose, with the risks to safety that that involves. It can rightly be described as occurring in a family violence context, not only because the respondent and [redacted] were former partners, but also because their three children were present either with her or with him. These matters clearly do not point to the offending being of the most serious kind; but they at least arguably place it well above “the lowest level”.
However, what I have said in the previous paragraph (which reflects the tenor of the appellants submissions in this regard) does not rise above mere disagreement with his Honour’s assessment of the relevant factors. Where such disagreement is particularly stark or fundamental, it may possibly inform a conclusion that the sentence is manifestly inadequate—a topic considered later in these reasons. However, it does not point to a distinct error of principle or misunderstanding of the facts. It is clear that his Honour turned his mind, as required by s 33(a) of the Sentencing Act, to the nature and circumstances of the offence.
I was referred to DD v Ilievski [2016] ACTSC 115 at [28], where Murrell CJ observed that “the objective seriousness of stalking should be assessed by reference to the range of conduct that is captured by the concept of stalking as defined in s 35(2) of the [Crimes Act]”. While that is no doubt correct, it is not apparent that the Magistrate in the present case failed to assess the objective seriousness of the offending in this way. His Honour’s reference to a “level” of objective seriousness suggests that he did so. He was not required in his reasons to make express comparisons with other kinds of conduct that would constitute stalking.
Ground (a) must be rejected.
Ground (b)
After expressing the conclusion discussed above concerning objective seriousness, the Magistrate turn to the subjective circumstances. In that connection, he observed:
He is currently unemployed. It appears that there is a real possibility he has lost his employment as a result of these matters. There is also a real possibility that he has not been able to obtain further work in the last couple of weeks as a result of these matters. He has attended two interviews and has missed out on those two jobs. There is a belief, at least in his mind, that it relates to what is going on in court today.
There is ongoing family law proceedings as I understand it. There has been a pause in his access to his young children and that’s no doubt cause problems with him and I have taken into account the extra curial effect of these proceedings on the defendant.
Later in the reasons, his Honour said:
I really can’t identify any extenuating circumstances but I do take into account the extra curial impact upon the defendant by these proceedings and also by a conviction.
Although these conclusions are expressed somewhat tentatively, counsel for the Crown eschewed any submission that no finding was actually made as to these forms of extra-curial punishment. That is an appropriate approach to reasons that are delivered ex tempore in dealing with a busy list and not subsequently revised for publication. I proceed on the basis that the Magistrate was persuaded that the respondent had lost work (and not been able to obtain new employment) as a result of the charges against him, and that his access to his children was restricted as a result of proceedings under the Family Law Act 1975 (Cth). This way understood, two errors are alleged to be present in these passages.
First, the evidentiary basis for the findings is unclear.
(a)The respondent’s loss of employment and difficulty obtaining new employment were mentioned in two of the documents placed before the Magistrate. A psychological assessment from Dr Jenna Bollinger referred to these events as part of the history evidently taken from the respondent himself, and recorded his belief that these things had occurred as a result of the criminal proceedings against him. A letter of support from the respondent’s current partner also referred to his unsuccessful attempts to obtain new employment and alleged that he had been told that the enterprises concerned could not hire someone with a criminal conviction for a family violence offence.
(b)The latter of these documents also referred to the existence of restrictions on the respondent seeing his children while another letter of support referred very briefly to the respondent being unable to see his children and to the existence of a “family law matter”. Reference was made in submissions to the Magistrate to the respondent having been denied access to the children since October 2021 (some months after the offending); however, I have not been taken to the specific source of this information and have not been able to identify it in the material.
Clearly, this material could not have sustained the findings made by the Magistrate if objection had been taken and the rules of evidence applied strictly to the sentencing hearing. However, those rules did not apply (Evidence Act 2011 (ACT), s 4(2)). It was therefore open to his Honour to have regard to the material and give it some weight. Although a different decision-maker might well have considered the material too slight to found a finding on the balance of probabilities that the respondent had suffered these detriments as a result of the charges against him, that is a matter of the weight given to evidence and does not point to a specific error of principle.
Secondly, it is submitted that the Magistrate had erred in principle in the weight that he gave to these matters of what were termed extra-curial punishment.
In R v Daetz [2003] NSWCCA 216; 139 A Crim R 398 James J, speaking for the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal, said at [62]:
[A] sentencing court, in determining what sentence it should impose on an offender, can properly take into account that the offender has already suffered some serious loss or detriment as a result of having committed the offence. This is so, even where the detriment the offender has suffered has taken the form of extra-curial punishment by private persons exacting retribution or revenge for the commission of the offence. In sentencing the offender the court takes into account what extra-curial punishment the offender has suffered, because the court is required to take into account all material facts and is required to ensure that the punishment the offender receives is what in all the circumstances is an appropriate punishment and not an excessive punishment. How much weight a sentencing judge should give any extra-curial punishment will, of course, depend on all the circumstances of the case. Indeed, there may well be many cases where extra-judicial punishment attracts little or no significant weight.
Although it was correctly submitted that consideration of such loss or detriment should not be allowed to overwhelm the other relevant considerations or treated as mitigating the objective seriousness of the offending, that has not occurred on my understanding of the Magistrate’s reasons. While his Honour concluded that the objective seriousness of the offending here was very low, I read that as flowing from his consideration of the offending itself. Extra-curial detriment was taken into account separately.
There is authority that loss of employment is a matter that the sentencing court can take into account as a form of extra-curial detriment: eg R v Gatica [2020] ACTSC 22 (Gatica), [40]–[42] (Loukas-Karlsson J), citing Ryan v The Queen [2001] HCA 21; 206 CLR 267, [54]. This indicates that there was no error of principle in giving some weight to the factual finding that the proceedings against the respondent had resulted in him losing employment and caused at least some difficulty in finding new employment.
It was submitted, however, that family law proceedings and a consequent hiatus in the respondent’s contact with his children was an “all but inevitable result of his conduct” and should not have been taken into account for that reason. Reliance was placed on R v Conway [2017] ACTSC 275 (Conway) at [42]–[43], where Penfold ACJ rejected a submission that the offender had suffered a form of extra-curial punishment by being separated from his children on the basis that “I am not convinced that this is anything more than an ordinary consequence of his actions”.
If this aspect of Conway is properly understood as stating a point of principle (rather than going to weight), it is very difficult to reconcile with the cases on loss of employment. For example, one of the cases cited in Gatica (at [40]) was Stanford v The Queen [2007] NSWCCA 73, where the offender was an apprentice locksmith who needed a security guard qualification in order to pursue his career. His conviction made that qualification unavailable, so that a need to find a different career was inevitable. It could rightly be said that Mr Stanford had brought this on itself; however, the Court held that it ought to have been taken into account on sentencing. Some degree of career turbulence will often be a very predictable, if not inevitable, consequence of offending if the offending is detected. So too, other forms of detriment that the courts have taken into account on sentencing are likely to be very unsurprising in the individual cases in which they arise: for example, traditional punishments in indigenous communities or violent retribution by associates of a victim.
In my view, if there is a distinction to be made in principle, the important question is not whether a particular detriment is inevitable or predictable in the individual case but whether it is something more than is generally to be expected as a consequence of the offending or of a conviction. Thus, loss of personal relationships or reputation is not normally taken into account as a factor in sentencing, whereas some hardship or detriment particular to the offender may well be. That hardship or detriment may be extra-curial (such as retribution by the victim’s associates) or it may be an anticipated consequence of the sentence itself (such as a factor that makes imprisonment more burdensome for the individual offender than for others). Beyond this, the limiting factor is the requirement for some level of seriousness: see, eg, R v Hannigan [2009] QCA 40 at [17]–[23] (Chesterman JA, de Jersey CJ agreeing).
Loss of contact with his children was, for the respondent, a far from surprising consequence of committing a stalking offence against his former wife in circumstances where the children were present. However, it arises from his family circumstances; it is not something every stalker should expect. There was material before the Magistrate indicating it left the respondent distraught. As a discretionary factor it could legitimately be given little weight; however, I do not think that the Magistrate erred in principle by taking it into account.
Ground (b) is therefore also rejected.
Ground (c)
In R v Duffy [2014] ACTCA 53; 297 FLR 359 at [53]–[60] the Court (Murrell CJ, Refshauge and Ross JJ) said:
On [an appeal against sentence], the Court of Appeal will intervene only if it is satisfied that there has been an error of the type referred to in House v The King (1936) 55 CLR 499. There must be a specific error of fact or law, or an implicit error that is discernible because the sentence is so plainly wrong (so “manifestly excessive” or “manifestly inadequate” or “outside the range of available sentences” or “dramatically inappropriate”) as to compel the conclusion that there has been an error in the exercise of the sentencing discretion, although no specific error can be identified: Dinsdale v The Queen (2000) 202 CLR 321 per Gaudron and Gummow JJ at [22]; Wong v The Queen (2001) 207 CLR 584 at [58]; Hili v The Queen (2010) 242 CLR 520 (Hili) at 58-59.
There is a narrow class of case in which it is appropriate for the Crown to appeal against the inadequacy of a sentence. Additional principles that have been accepted in relation to Crown appeals against sentence were set out in R v Eisenach [2011] ACTCA 2 at [8] and were summarised by Refshauge J in R v TW (2011) 6 ACTLR 18 (TW), and by Ross J in R v Hutchinson [2014] ACTCA 29 at 21–24, in all cases drawing on the analysis by Charles JA in R v Clarke (1996) 85 A Crim R 114, at 116–117. In TW at [4], Refshauge J said:
(i) An appeal by the Crown should be brought only in the rare and exceptional case to establish some point of principle.
(ii) Occasions may arise for the bringing of a Crown appeal: (a) when a sentence reveals such manifest inadequacy or inconsistency in sentencing standards as to constitute an error in principle; (b) where it is necessary for a court of criminal appeal to lay down principles for the governance and guidance of courts having the duty of sentencing a convicted person; (c) to enable the courts to establish and maintain adequate standards of punishment for crime; (d) to enable idiosyncratic views of individual judges as to particular crimes or types of crimes to be corrected; (e) to correct a sentence which is so disproportionate to the seriousness of the crime as to shock the public conscience; and (f) to ensure, as far as the subject matter permits, that there will be uniformity of sentencing.
In Green v The Queen (2011) 244 CLR 462 (Green) at [1] the majority (French CJ, Crennan and Kiefel JJ) said (citing Barwick CJ’s statement in Griffiths v The Queen (1977) 137 CLR 293 (Griffiths) at 310):
The primary purpose of appeals against sentence by the Attorney-General or Director of Public Prosecutions (Crown appeals) under s 5D of the Criminal Appeal Act 1912 (NSW) is “to lay down principles for the governance and guidance of courts having the duty of sentencing convicted persons”.
(Citations omitted)
Similarly, in R v Riddle (2010) 4 ACTLR 153 at [6], the Court referred to Barwick CJ’s statement in Griffiths, affirming that a Crown appeal should be brought only when a matter of principle arises or where it is necessary to maintain the proper administration of justice.
Point (ii) made by Refshauge J in TW does no more than provide examples of the ways in which courts have expressed the principle set out in (i) and they must be read in that context. In relation to sub point (e) (the sentence is so grossly disproportionate to the crime as to “shock the public conscience”), the phrase has been frequently used by appellate courts but may be apt to mislead and suggest a more populist influence on sentencing than is intended or appropriate. The phrase has been subject to recent criticism (see, for example, R v McPartland & Polkinghorne [2014] SASCFC 84 at [22]‑[29]) which, if accepted, may reduce the usefulness of the phrase as a description of one of the particulars of the purpose of the Crown appeal against sentence.
In any event, on this appeal, the Crown did not resort to the argument that the sentences “shocked the public conscience”, but properly advanced arguments that the sentences were contrary to principle.
In R v Baker [2000] NSWCCA 85 Spigelman CJ (with whom Grove and Hidden JJ agreed) dismissed a Crown appeal in which the court had been “asked to infer a legal error from the mere inadequacy of the sentence” (at [12]). His Honour said at [19]:
The authorities make it clear that Crown appeals should be rare. It may be that present practice does not reflect that restriction, nevertheless, successful Crown appeals should be rare. This is particularly so with respect to that category of appeals in which no particular error can be identified in the sentencing process and the Crown must rely on an assertion of manifest inadequacy as a basis for a conclusion that some error of principle must have occurred.
It will be very difficult for the Crown to succeed on an appeal where it relies solely on “manifest inadequacy” and seeks to infer an error of principle from the length and/or nature of the sentence. Whereas offender appeals are concerned with the correction of error in particular cases, prosecution appeals are brought to establish matters of principle. In prosecution appeals, the focus must remain firmly on the question of whether there has been an error of principle.
The last paragraph of this passage was cited with approval by the Court, in setting out general principles in relation to appeals for manifest inadequacy or manifest excess, in R v UG [2020] ACTCA 8; 281 A Crim R 273 (UG) at [41]–[43]. The summary of principles in UG was in turn adopted by the Court in The Queen v Stacker [2020] ACTCA 34 at [141] (Loukas-Karlsson J, Murrell CJ and Charlesworth J agreeing at [18]). The Court in UG also referred to R v Rappel [2019] ACTCA 11 (Rappel) at [10], where it was said that Crown appeals should be commenced only for particular purposes including:
(a)to correct a sentence that reveals such manifest inadequacy or inconsistency in sentencing standards as to constitute an error in principle;
(b) to enable the Court to establish and maintain adequate standards of punishment;
(c) to ensure uniformity in sentencing, so far as the subject matter permits.
Meanwhile, in a case of manifest excess, it has been said that:
The relevant test is whether the sentence is unreasonable or plainly unjust. A sentence which is unreasonable or plainly unjust for no reason other than that it is manifestly too long is a sentence which is erroneous in point of principle because it has not been imposed according to the rules of reason or justice.
(citations omitted)
(Dalton v The Queen [2015] ACTCA 48, [18], also cited in UG).
These authorities indicate that the grounds of manifest excess and manifest inadequacy, while having important similarities, are not mirror images of each other. The justice of the individual case can properly lead an appellate court to conclude that a sentence is manifestly excessive, whereas manifest inadequacy appeals to systemic considerations such as those mentioned in Rappel.
One thing that these two grounds do have in common, however, is that they proceed by characterising or drawing inferences from the sentence itself, not by identifying specific error in the reasoning supporting it. The Court in UG (at [43]) expressly agreed with the following statement of Priest JA in Director of Public Prosecutions v Ristevski [2019] VSCA 287 at [62]:
Much of the argument on the appeal seemed directed to assertions of specific error. That may be because, as has become customary, the ground of appeal complaining of manifest inadequacy had six subjoined ‘particulars’. In my opinion, however, supposed particulars of manifest inadequacy are, at best, a distraction; and at worst, are calculated to subvert the essential inquiry that must be made when it is asserted that a sentence is manifestly inadequate. Indeed, undue attention to ‘particulars’ invites a piecemeal consideration of the relevant features of a case, inconsistent with an approach which intuitively synthesises all relevant factors.
In the light of this observation (with which, with respect, I also agree), I have resisted the suggestion of the appellant that I should treat the points raised under grounds (a) and (b) as particulars of ground (c). However, I am persuaded that the sentence imposed in this case is manifestly inadequate. This is for the following reasons.
First, in the light of the features of the offending referred to at [4] above, I cannot agree that it was “very much towards the lowest level of objective seriousness”. It was, in my view, well removed from the least serious case of stalking that could be imagined. The present sentence, if treated as a guide for future decisions, would lead to a wide range of offending not attracting punishment. That would be inconsistent with the understanding that a non-conviction order is “a disposition which falls outside of the ordinary”: Bennet v Daley [2021] ACTSC 159, [49] (Burns J).
I say this because the making of a non-conviction order here cannot be explained on the basis that the respondent’s personal circumstances called for some special degree of leniency. Although I have concluded that it was not improper for the Magistrate to take into account the detriments that the respondent had suffered as a result of the charges against him, that cannot overwhelm considerations of deterrence and denunciation. Nor did the respondent’s circumstances here call for such a degree of leniency as to demand that no conviction be recorded. It is to be expected that many other perpetrators of stalking offences will suffer similar extra-curial consequences in terms of family law proceedings and compromised employment prospects.
Secondly, and relatedly, the sentence does not adequately denounce the offending. The legislature has chosen to criminalise this behaviour and provide for a maximum penalty that is not insignificant (two years’ imprisonment). Sentences imposed by the courts should reflect that assessment of the seriousness of the behaviour and the need to deter it.
Thirdly, it was submitted that the sentence is out of kilter with current sentencing practice and thus offends the value that the law places on consistency and predictability. In this connection I was referred to eight recent decisions of this Court and the Magistrates Court, which I will not summarise individually (they were Morrison v Maher (No 2) [2022] ACTSC 63; R v EN [2020] ACTSC 302; R v EP [2019] ACTSC 242; R v NO (No 2) [2018] ACTSC 39; R v Kulcycski [2018] ACTSC 9; R v DD [2017] ACTSC 109; Police v Paul Stanik [2022] ACTMC 2; Amberger v Stagg [2019] ACTMC 26). Needless to say, all depended on their own facts and none are closely comparable to the present case. All of these cases involved offending that was more serious than the offending in the present case; however, it is noteworthy that all resulted in a sentence including a term of imprisonment and none was wholly suspended. I am persuaded that the sentence in the present case, including as it does a non-conviction order, is an outlier; and this reinforces to some degree the reasons I have set out above. However, the contrast with other cases is not so clear as to amount in its own right to a sufficient basis for concluding that the sentence is inadequate.
Residual discretion
The issues that remain are whether, despite having concluded that the sentence is manifestly inadequate, the Court has a discretion not to intervene and whether it should exercise that discretion.
In Kirby v Ali [2021] ACTSC 95 at [60] Robinson AJ held that, in a review appeal under Division 3.10.3 of the Magistrates Court Act, there is no discretion not to set aside the decision below if an appealable error is found. His Honour came to that view as a matter of construction of s 219F, having particular regard to s 219F(5) which provides that an appeal may be dismissed if the court considers that “no substantial miscarriage of justice has happened”. Although I was urged to hold that Robinson AJ was wrong on this point, the submission was not developed; and I would not depart from his Honour’s reasoning unless persuaded that it was plainly wrong. Having regard to the terms of s 219F(5), I am inclined to conclude that his Honour was correct. I am certainly not convinced that he was plainly wrong.
It is therefore strictly unnecessary to consider whether, if there were a discretion not to intervene, that discretion should be exercised. However, I note that I am not aware of any reason why the conclusions I have reached should not result in the sentence being set aside and the respondent resentenced under s 219F(2)(c).
Resentencing
The appellant did not seek to take the resentencing exercise any further than to correct what was said to be the error involved in making a non-conviction order. Counsel for the appellant accepted that the respondent’s subjective circumstances weighed in his favour, that he had a very modest criminal history and was of good character. It was not suggested that I should impose a term of imprisonment including a suspended term. In my view, those concessions were appropriate.
I therefore propose simply to convict the respondent of the offence with which he was charged and make a good behaviour order under s 13 of the Sentencing Act. As to that conditions of that order, I note that the Magistrate imposed only the core conditions. There may have been something to be said for an additional condition, as a further overt indication of the Court’s disapproval of the offending behaviour, that the respondent not contact or approach [redacted]. However, this was not sought by the Crown. In a Crown appeal on sentence, it is at least preferable to do no more than correct the aspect of the sentence that is said to involve error.
Orders
The orders I will make are as follows.
(1)The appeal is allowed.
(2)The order and sentence imposed on the respondent on 20 April 2022 is set aside.
(3)The respondent is convicted on the charge of stalking (CAN 14257/2020), contrary to s 35 of the Crimes Act 1900 (ACT).
(4)The respondent is ordered to sign or give an undertaking to comply with the offender’s good behaviour obligations under the Crimes (Sentence Administration) Act 2005 (ACT) for a period of 12 months commencing on 20 April 2022.
| I certify that the preceding forty [40] numbered paragraphs are a true copy of the Reasons for Judgment of his Honour Justice Kennett Associate: Date: |
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