Re TS (No 2)

[2024] VSC 218

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF VICTORIA Not Restricted

AT MELBOURNE
CRIMINAL DIVISION

S ECR 2024 0068

IN THE MATTER of the Bail Act 1977

and

IN THE MATTER of an Application for Bail by TS

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JUDGE:	BEACH JA
WHERE HELD:	Melbourne
DATE OF HEARING:	6 May 2024
DATE OF JUDGMENT:	6 May 2024
CASE MAY BE CITED AS:	Re TS (No 2)
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION:	[2024] VSC 218

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CRIMINAL LAW – Bail previously granted on stringent conditions – Breaches of bail – Changed circumstances – Revocation of bail – Breach of multiple conditions of bail, including failing to attend judicial monitoring – Unacceptable risk that applicant would, if released on bail, endanger the safety and welfare of other persons – Bail revoked.

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APPEARANCES:	Counsel	Solicitors
For the Applicant	Ms S Ndou	Victoria Legal Aid
For the Respondent	Mr A Sprague	Ms A Hogan, Solicitor for Public Prosecutions

HIS HONOUR:

1. On 5 April 2024, I granted the applicant bail on stringent conditions.[1]  The background to this matter is set out in the reasons I published at that time.  This judgment assumes knowledge of those reasons and should be read together with them.

   [1]Re TS [2024] VSC 164 (’Bail Reasons’).

1. Pursuant to the orders I made on 5 April 2024, the applicant was required to appear in Court this morning for judicial monitoring.  Shortly prior to the judicial monitoring hearing, the Court received a Supervised Bail Progress Report[2] from Youth Justice (‘the updated Youth Justice Report’). While the applicant was represented by counsel at the hearing this morning, he did not personally attend the hearing and his whereabouts seem to be unknown.

   [2]Dated 3 May 2024.

1. The updated Youth Justice Report records that, since his release from detention on 5 April 2024, the applicant’s engagement on the Youth Justice Supervised Bail Program has been ‘unsatisfactory’.  The report provides that, notwithstanding the ‘expectation and agreement that [the applicant] attends twice weekly youth justice appointments and engages with school and referred services’, since 15 April 2024, the applicant has missed all of his appointments with Youth Justice.  Additionally, the report states that the applicant, in breach of his bail conditions, has not been residing at his home since 17 April 2024.

1. On 27 April 2024, the applicant was arrested by Victoria Police. He was, however, released pending further enquiries and is thus not currently in custody. This morning I was told that, while the applicant has not yet been charged, his arrest related to allegations of theft.

1. During the course of this morning’s hearing, the respondent submitted that the applicant’s bail should be revoked.  I accept that submission.

1. On 5 April 2024, I granted bail because, in circumstances where I was able to impose stringent conditions on a grant of bail, the respondent had not persuaded me that, if released on bail, the risk that the applicant would endanger the safety or welfare of any person, was an unacceptable risk.[3]  At the time, I also noted that circumstances can change and that an assessment of risk may have to be revisited.[4]  As it has now turned out, circumstances have changed and the assessment of the risk that the applicant would, if released on bail, endanger the safety or welfare of any person must be revisited.

   [3]Bail Reasons, [36].

   [4]Ibid.

1. While the applicant is not alleged to have committed any offences of violence since being granted bail a little over a month ago, the breaches of bail committed by the applicant since that grant (including his failure to appear in Court today as required by his conditions of bail) appear to show a disdain he has for abiding by court orders. It follows a pattern of what also appears to be a disdain for observing the law and a disdain for the consequences of any non-compliance by him with court imposed restrictions.

1. In the circumstances, there now appears to me to be an equal likelihood that the applicant will engage in, or be a party to the encouragement of, further violent offending if he were to be permitted to remain on bail. Plainly, the applicant’s time in detention, prior to being granted bail on 5 April, was not as salutary an experience as had been hoped.[5]

   [5]Ibid [18], [29], n 15.

1. In any event, in the light of the applicant’s breaches of the bail granted to him on 5 April 2024, I am now satisfied that, if he were permitted to remain on bail, there is an unacceptable risk that he would endanger the safety or welfare of other persons, and that there are no conditions that I can impose which would reduce that risk to an acceptable level.[6]  Bail must therefore be revoked.[7]

   [6]See ss 4E(1)(a)(i) and 4E(3)(b) of the Bail Act 1977.

   [7]Re KA (No 2) [2022] VSC 363.

1. The order made on 5 April 2024 admitting the applicant to bail is revoked.