R v Lane
[2001] VSC 510
•20 December 2001
| IN THE SUPREME COURT OF VICTORIA | Not Restricted |
AT MELBOURNE
CRIMINAL DIVISION
No. 1529 of 2001
| THE QUEEN |
| v |
| CHERYLE MURIEL LANE |
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JUDGE: | TEAGUE J | |
WHERE HELD: | Melbourne | |
DATE OF HEARING: | 13 December 2001 | |
DATE OF SENTENCE: | 20 December 2001 | |
CASE MAY BE CITED AS: | R v. Cheryle Muriel Lane | |
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION: | [2001] VSC 510 | |
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Criminal Law – Sentencing – Attempting to pervert the course of public justice – Serious interference with investigation of a very serious crime – Multiple mitigating circumstances – sentence of 3 years imprisonment suspended for 3 years.
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APPEARANCES: | Counsel | Solicitors |
| For the Crown | Mr. B. Kayser | Office of Public Prosecutions |
| For the Accused | Mr. D. Drake | Victoria Legal Aid |
HIS HONOUR:
You have pleaded guilty to one count of attempting to pervert the course of public justice. The charge arises out of the disappearance last year of Earl Mooring.
You met Earl Mooring in 1997. Between 1997 and 2000, the character of the relationship between you varied. At times it was sexual, and confidences were shared. At times there was hostility and suspicion and no contact. Over that time, he lived alone in Corio, in northern Geelong. He had separated from his wife only in 1996. Their four children had grown up and were living their own lives, although they kept in touch with him. He worked in security for the shipping line operating the service to Tasmania. He worked one month on and one month off. He was planning to retire on reaching the age of 55, in July of this year. He was careful with money. He kept money in the bank. He also kept a considerable amount of money hidden away in parts of his house. At a time that he shared confidences with you, he told you of that hidden money.
In the time you knew Earl Mooring, you lived with a teenage daughter in Whittington, in eastern Geelong. You had married three times. You had four children. Your two sons and the older daughter had grown up and were living their own lives. Two of the four are not significant for present purposes. Your younger son and your younger daughter are very significant. Your younger son, who lived in Queensland, was married there in 1999. You travelled by car to the wedding with your daughter and Earl Mooring. Your son and Earl Mooring met each other then. The trip to Queensland did not go well. The relationship between you and Earl Mooring was soured for some time. For a time you kept your distance. But, by July 2000, you and Earl Mooring were back in contact as friends.
On the night of 5 July 2000, he was at sea. His house was broken into and ransacked. The break-in cost Earl Mooring dearly. Some of the damage to the house had a particular character. The damage was not indicative of the burglary being just a random one. It was such as to indicate that the burglar knew that there was a considerable amount of money hidden in the house. For a time up to that night, your son had been in Geelong with a friend from Queensland. He left Geelong that night. He headed back to Queensland. You had a number of telephone conversations with him as he headed north.
After 5 July, you consoled Earl Mooring about his loss. You kept in quite close contact with him. You also kept in close contact with your son. On 10 October 2000, your son came back to Geelong. He went to your home with the same friend from Queensland. You knew that your son had plans to do something to Earl Mooring. Your son said he would sort him out. Knowing of those plans, you left Geelong with your daughter to visit relatives in Melbourne. Around 9 p.m., when you were still closer to Melbourne than Geelong, you spoke by telephone with your son. He asked you to ring Earl Mooring and to ask him to go to your home.
You rang Earl Mooring on his mobile phone. You lied to him. You said that a suspicious utility was outside your home. You asked him to come over. When he said that he would come with a friend, you told him not to bring the friend. You telephoned your son. You told him that Earl Mooring was coming over. Earl Mooring did as you asked him to do. He has not been seen since, except of course by those waiting for him at your home.
You and your daughter got back to your home, sometime after 10 p.m. Your son was there. He told you a story. The story warranted sceptical appraisal. The story was that Earl Mooring had came in with a gun, that he had shot your son’s friend and that he had then gone. You saw red stains on the family room carpet. You recognised the stains as blood. Your son told you to clean up the stains. He then left. You told your daughter that you wanted to get rid of all evidence because you did not want your son to get into trouble. You and your daughter worked on cleaning up the blood on the carpet. After your daughter went to bed, your son returned. This time he gave you a different story. He said Earl Mooring was tied up. Your son wanted you to speak to Earl Mooring to ask him where his money was. Your son later telephoned you with a different story again. It was that Earl Mooring had had a heart attack and died, and your son did not know where the body was.
In the early hours of 11 October, you went to work on the family room carpet. You cut it into pieces with a Stanley knife. When your daughter got up the next morning, she found only a concrete slab where the carpet had been. You asked her to help you dump the carpet pieces in a tip. You told her that you and she were just making sure that your son would not get into trouble. You packed up the track suit and the shoes you had been wearing while doing the cleaning up. You put them in a plastic bag and disposed of them. The shoes were thrown out of the car near a breakwater. The clothes were put in a service station charity bin.
After Earl Mooring was reported missing, the family of Earl Mooring sought information from you. You misled and lied to them. The police came to you looking for your assistance. You misled and lied to them. On 15 November 2000, you provided a long statement to the police. Your son got a mention only in that there was reference to his wedding in 1999. There was no mention of his being in Geelong on 5 July and 10 October 2000. There was no mention of him in any way linked to the July burglary. There was no mention of him being at your home on the night of 10 October. Your daughter was asked to provide the police with a statement, and she did. As she later told the police, you and your son put pressure on her. You prevailed on her to mislead and lie to the police in that statement.
The police came to learn of your lies and deception. They obtained telephone records. They arranged telephone intercepts. They looked at withdrawals or attempted withdrawals from the bank account of Earl Mooring after 10 October. The first was in Geelong at 1.11 a.m. on 11 October. After that there were more. The location of the banks indicated a movement north to Queensland. The police told you that they knew that you had lied to them. They sought to get from you the truth. The pressure on you grew, and it was not just from the police. On Christmas Day, your son came from Queensland to Melbourne. You and your daughter drove with him to Queensland.
Early in February 2001, members of the Homicide Squad went to Queensland. On 10 February, your daughter provided a second statement. That statement revealed many respects in which she had earlier misled and lied to the police. It also made clear that you had lied. On 13 February, you provided a second statement. That statement revealed many respects in which you had earlier misled and lied to the police.
On 15 October 2001, when a committal hearing of the charge to which you have pleaded guilty was scheduled, you pleaded guilty. No charge has been laid against your son or against any other person relative to the disappearance and apparent death of Earl Mooring.
I turn to the victim impact statements of Earl Mooring’s estranged wife, of his two sons and two daughters and of his grandson. I have read them with attention to the detail. They are moving. They reveal the added concerns of relatives where there has been no body to place in a grave. In such circumstances, there can be no proper closure. Grief is prolonged by the uncertainty linked with a disappearance. There is an added element of trauma where loved ones know nothing of the mechanism of death, and of what occurred in the time preceding death.
You may not know what has happened to Earl Mooring. Given what your son told you, the murder of Earl Mooring was clearly amongst what was possible. The seriousness of the criminality which the courts are prevented from punishing is clearly a factor to be taken into account in assessing your criminality. You withheld vital information as to the apparent kidnapping and death of a man who had trusted you and whose trust you had betrayed by luring him into an ambush. You persisted in misleading the police investigations. The longer you did so, the less chance there was that he or they who ought to have been brought before the courts, could be. The success of your efforts can at least be partly gauged by the circumstance that no charges have been laid.
The crime to which you have pleaded guilty carries a maximum sentence of 25 years. That is an indication of how seriously the crime can be seen to be. The administration of justice depends upon criminals being brought to court and punished. There are not many more serious offences than those which interfere with the course of justice by preventing the courts from dealing justly with those properly brought before them. What you did amounted to a serious interference with the investigation of a very serious crime.
I turn to your background. You are 53 years of age, having been born in August 1948. Your upbringing was a troubled one, but grandparents prevented it being particularly bad. Your education was of mixed quality. You appear to be of above average intelligence. More might have been achieved if the opportunities had been available. You have a very commendable work record. You continue to work long hours under an assumed name. You are under the witness protection program. You and your daughter have been obliged to assume new identities. The indications are that a high level of protection is called for. I accept that the punitive consequences are considerable. Your daughter will be adversely affected. For that, you should and will feel guilty. However, I note that she is nearly 18 years of age, and likely to shortly enter university. Through a loss of property , and through the loss of the most precious of assets, namely family and friends, you have already been and will continue to be severely punished. You are in the early stage of multiple sclerosis. Your treatment will be adversely affected by problems with communication given the continuing need for you to use an assumed name. For the rest of your days in the witness protection program, perhaps for the rest of your life, you will be looking over your shoulder.
There are significant other mitigating considerations for me to take into account. You have no prior convictions. You have pleaded guilty at the first opportunity. That has avoided cost. It has also avoided distress to witnesses. I must and do give you some credit for providing a degree of co-operation to the police. The credit is scarcely substantial and for several reasons. They include that the co-operation was late in coming. Further, it was questionably complete. Further, you have stated that you do not propose to voluntarily give evidence for the prosecution if your son is charged.
Finally I note that what these events bring home is that being a mother can be an enormous burden. The pressures that can be shrugged off by others can be close to intolerable for a mother. Objectivity in a mother in predicting the potential for seriously bad behaviour of a son can be impossible. Likewise as to reviewing after the event how seriously bad the behaviour has been. To a mother, the protection of her own child can be all-important. On occasions, a mother can be a pawn in the hands of her own child. That you were became clear when I took up a suggestion of Mr Kayser. It was that I might read closely the transcripts of telephone calls on 23 December 2000. Until I did so, I was unpersuaded that a suspended sentence was an appropriate option. I am now satisfied that it is.
I impose a sentence of three years imprisonment. I suspend, for a period of three years, the whole of the period of the sentence. I declare a period of 14 days pre-sentence detention. I direct that that period be entered in the appropriate records.
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