R v Bailey - [1999] QCA 40

99.40

COURT OF APPEAL

PINCUS JA THOMAS JA SHEPHERDSON J

CA No 15 OF 1999
THE QUEEN
v.

RIALL SHANE BAILEY

Applicant

BRISBANE
..DATE 24/02/99
240299 T16-17/CAK12 M/T COA 28/99
PINCUS JA: The applicant Mr Bailey, who appeared for himself
today and made some submissions, which were of assistance, was
convicted of numerous offences of dishonesty and sentenced to
various terms of imprisonment in the District Court on
22 September 1998. The longest term was eight years and
various terms were made concurrent.
According to the applicant he lodged the relevant notice at
the prison on 22 October 1998 and since he was sentenced on
22 September 1998 the notice, it appears to me, was in time.
The question whether it was in time or otherwise does not loom
large, however, because Mr Moynihan was content to argue the
matter substantively for the Crown. The question therefore
simply becomes whether or not the applicant has demonstrated
that the sentence was manifestly excessive.

There were ninety-four offences considered by His Honour Judge McGuire, thirty-three of them charged on indictment and sixty-one are included in a schedule and are the subject of a request by the applicant to have them taken into account. The indictment offences consisted of fourteen counts of fraud, two of receiving, one of unlawful use of a motor vehicle, eight of forgery and eight of uttering. And the sixty-one offences were to put it simply, of a similar character. The amount of property obtained was in excess of $300,000.

The applicant was born in October 1955 and so is forty-three years of age. He submits that he has had a serious addiction 240299 T16-17/CAK12 M/T COA 28/99

to gambling and his criminal record, which is a bad one, is attributed to this addiction. His criminal career started when he was a teenager, as Mr Bailey himself has pointed out. But his first prison sentence was for assault occasioning bodily harm, in 1974. He has been sentenced to other terms of imprisonment on quite a number of occasions. The longest period of imprisonment was one imposed in 1992 in respect of numerous offences of a character similar to the present and that produced a term of imprisonment of five years. To be slightly more accurate, he was sentenced to two five year terms on different occasions in 1992, one in August 1992 and another in September 1992 in respect of another batch of dishonesty offences.

He was, it appears, released on parole on 7 May 1995 but he
was arrested in September 1997 on the charges with which we
are concerned, all of them committed while on parole. By the
time the applicant came to be sentenced by Judge McGuire on
22 September 1998 for the current charges, he had served about

an additional year of his five year sentence, imposed in 1992.

He therefore had about a year and four months to go.

The eight year term imposed by the District Court was made concurrent, so in effect…

Grounds of appeal

[14] The appellant contends that the primary judge erred in finding that the respondent had discharged the onus of establishing the matters required under the relevant provision.

[15] It was submitted that his Honour failed to give adequate weight to the evidence of the second witness, and that the findings of fact were not reasonably open on the material before the Court.

[16] The respondent, for its part, submits that no error is disclosed, and that the conclusions reached were well within the range of outcomes available to the primary judge.

Consideration

[17] It is convenient to deal first with the question of construction, as the resolution of that issue informs the remaining grounds advanced by the appellant.

[18] For the reasons that follow, we are of the view that the appeal should be allowed in part and the matter remitted for further determination.

Continue reading R v Bailey

Details

AGLC: R v Bailey [1999] QCA 40
Case: [1999] QCA 40
Decision Date: 24/02/1999

CaseChat Overview and Summary

The case of R v Bailey involved Riall Shane Bailey, who was convicted of numerous offences of dishonesty and subsequently sentenced to imprisonment by the District Court. Bailey appealed against his sentence in the Court of Appeal. The appeal challenged the sentence's excessiveness and sought an extension of time for the appeal. The Court of Appeal, comprising Pincus JA, Thomas JA, and Shepherdson J, reviewed the application.

The primary legal issues revolved around whether the sentence imposed by the District Court was manifestly excessive and if the appeal was lodged within the statutory time frame. The court needed to determine if the sentence was within the appropriate range considering the nature and extent of the offences committed by Bailey.

The Court of Appeal considered the extensive criminal history of Bailey, which included multiple instances of dishonesty offences, and the seriousness of the current offences, which amounted to over $300,000 in fraudulent activities. Despite Bailey's argument that he had a gambling addiction and had cooperated with the police, the court found that the sentence was not manifestly excessive. The judges noted that the sentence was within the appropriate range for such serious offences of dishonesty and took into account Bailey's persistent offending history. The court refused the application for leave to appeal against the sentence and the application for an extension of time.

The court ordered that the application for leave to appeal against the sentence be refused and that the application for an extension of time be refused insofar as it was necessary.

Orders