Sentence: 4 years imprisonment with NPP of 2 years and 6 months.
[2]
Joanne Peters, on 5 February 2026 you pleaded guilty to one rolled-up charge of theft, which occurred between 8 November 2019 and 15 July 2022. You have now also pleaded guilty to a charge of breaching a suspended sentence imposed in this Court by me on 23 February 2021.
The charge of theft to which you have pleaded guilty is the cause of the breach of the suspended sentence. You will now be sentenced for the charge of theft and also for the breach itself, and you will be re-sentenced for the earlier theft. The maximum penalty for theft is 10 years' imprisonment, and for the breach it is three months.
I shall outline the details of the more recent theft first. It is a rolled-up charge of a series of thefts by you from your employer Spence & Company Pty Ltd, known as Spence Doors.
In a total of 25 transactions you stole $302,386.67. The transactions are set out in Schedule A, which shall be appended to these sentencing remarks[1]. The smallest transaction was for $1,491.60. The largest was for $31,143.55. Thirteen transactions were for amounts greater than $10,000.
You were employed as an accounts payable officer from 2018 to 2022. You had access to software that was used for the daily payment run for the organisation. There was no limit on your access and your actions did not require authorisation by another person. You were a trusted employee and breached that trust in an egregious way, using a planned, meticulous and sophisticated process.
Sometime in late July or early August 2022 your employer received an anonymous tip-off in an envelope addressed to the manager, containing a newspaper article stating that a Joanne Peters had been sentenced to a three-year suspended sentence by the County Court.
Your employer began an investigation and discovered suspicious changes to several suppliers' bank account details. Those details were charged to other accounts, before being charged back again to the original bank account details. It was discovered that 25 transactions were made into two accounts, both of which were yours.
During this process you duplicated supplier invoices, inflated invoices and paid suppliers in error, and the requested refunds went into your accounts.
On 23 February 2021, as I said earlier, I sentenced you to the suspended sentence for the earlier offending. Your offending at Spence Doors began during the previous year and continued until July 2022.
A search warrant was executed on your bank in April 2023, revealing that the bank account numbers involved in the transactions were both accounts in your name, and with you being the only signatory. You were arrested on 31 January 2024. When interviewed you made no admissions but agreed you had worked for Spence Doors.
Approximately a month later the suspended sentence expired.
At a committal mention in July 2024 you indicated you would plead guilty and a plea was listed, and on 25 November 2024 the plea was adjourned.
I digress briefly to explain that a number of further adjournments took place over the next 12 months, because of the problems you encountered with funding your legal representation, and for significant periods of time you were appearing unrepresented. On one occasion you failed to appear and a warrant was issued for your apprehension.
Eventually, the Law and Advocacy Centre for Women became involved and it appears that legal aid funding was facilitated through their involvement. I have been provided with a letter from Melissa Walsh, a Senior Case manager at the Centre, providing details of intensive support given to you since December last year, with assurances of the offer for this support to continue as necessary. Real progress was established in this case once the Centre became involved, and I wish to acknowledge that valuable assistance.
I return now to other matters pertaining to the details of the offending.
Spence Doors was bought by ASSA ABLOY Door Group Pty Ltd on 1 April 2019. A director of that company, Phillip McKay, provided a Victim Impact Statement, in which he explained that the purchase was followed by a difficult integration with turnover of staff, loss of confidence from key customers resulting in declining sales and very low staff morale.
It was quite difficult, he explained, to conduct day-to-day business, and matters were made significantly worse as a result of your crimes, which were occurring at that time and were then disclosed. Finance staff were lost, owing to feelings of embarrassment and shame that it had happened on their watch. This indicates the significance of the breach of trust represented by your offending.
Approximately $400,000 was lost in expenses necessitated by staff recruitment, legal advice, assistance from a forensic accountant, the replacement of monies lost, and other areas of loss which have not been specified.
I turn now to the offending in 2011- 2012 which resulted in the suspended sentence. The charge was a rolled-up charge of theft of $200,000 stolen from your then-employer Coldflow Pty Ltd. On 60 occasions you manipulated accounting records to conceal your misappropriations. Suspicious entries were found and you were moved to another role. You were asked about these and were evasive but eventually made admissions and agreed to repayments.
You repaid $30,000 before the company lost contact with you. The family home was sold and in mid-2013 you repaid a further amount of $32,360 to Coldflow, making a total of $62,360.40 in repayments.
Your bank records disclosed that you spent almost $48,000 at gaming venues, and other monies were paid into your accounts and those of family members. You were interviewed by police in 2018 and charged in April 2020.
The staff at Coldflow described the difficulties of reconstruction of accounting records after the thefts were discovered, and the personal toll this took on them. It was a significant breach of trust.
In imposing a suspended sentence, I took into account a number of mitigating circumstances, which included your childhood experiences of parental neglect and abuse, with the disclosure of more details.
You grew up without love and affection from your parents, and your mother was cold and critical towards you. Your father, who was loud and aggressive, would beat you very regularly with a belt. Despite this you took on responsibility for them as they aged, and after your father's death you have continued to support your mother who suffers considerable health problems.
You were bullied at school during your early secondary years for being overweight, and you had little self-confidence and low self-esteem. You did well at school and finished Year 12, later getting a job at a bank and working in accounting roles since then until this offending was discovered.
You married at the age of 21 and had two children. Your husband was emotionally and psychologically abusive towards you from the start. He controlled your finances and was controlling and narcissistic in other ways as well. He worked initially on the naval base at Cribb Point, where families could also live, but your husband said he did not want you and the children there. He spent long periods away from the family, and was absent from when your daughter was six weeks old until she was 18 months old. For 12 years you raised the children alone. Your husband had a prolonged extra-marital affair, which resulted indirectly in your estrangement from your sister.
You are close to your other sister, and have one close friend, both of whom provide support for you.
For the purposes of the plea hearing in 2021 you were seen by Psychologist Patrick Newton. He diagnosed persistent depressive disorder with a wide range of symptoms, since childhood, which would have been of relatively mild intensity at the time of the offending. and then later with bouts of suicidal ideation.
Very recently you were seen by psychologist Sandra Cokorilo. She also diagnosed persistent depressive disorder, with recurrent episodes of Major depressive Disorder and Generalised Anxiety Disorder, apparently having developed since the 2021 diagnosis. She also noted emotional vulnerability and dependent personality traits, with a tendency to engage in maladaptive coping strategies when overwhelmed and unsupported. Despite this, Ms Cokorilo considered that your psychopathology did not affect your capacity to understand the wrongfulness of your actions, noting that the offending required sustained planning, concealment and functional operational performance for an extended period.
Ms Cokorilo also referred to the report from the Mental Health Advice & Response Service (MHARS) dated 17 December 2025 which noted three psychiatric hospital admissions in 2022 and 2023 and a history of suicidal ideation with two suicide attempts. Records from Frankston Hospital document these admissions.
[3]
There are several factors which indicate that the thefts from Spence Doors was more serious offending than the previous theft from Coldflow. The sum stolen was one third greater, the difference being $102, 386.67. The effects upon the business were considerable, as Mr McKay spelled out.
The nature of the offence is inherently serious, involving deliberate and calculated dishonesty over an extended period of time. The offending at Spence Doors was only discovered through a 'tip-off' rather than by any disclosure made by you.
The individual transactions began on 8 November 2019, before you were sentenced on 23 February 2021 and continued after that date, until 15 July 2022. You would have been well aware that the repetitive deceptions, both before and after your sentence, amounted to a serious breach of the trust placed in you by your employer. You used your knowledge and experience in accounting with the same or similar sophistication as previously. These circumstances are an aggravating factor.
The sentence imposed earlier should have acted as a clear deterrent, an opportunity to desist from repeated offending. At the time of sentencing your prospects for rehabilitation appeared to be good, subject to you engaging in treatment, which you failed to do with any consistency.
Specific deterrence is therefore a relevant sentencing consideration, as is general deterrence. Deceptions against an employer, particularly when involving breach of trust, is heinous offending, and should be firmly denounced by the court. The sentence imposed should aim to reflect that condemnation and deter others from such dishonesty.
[4]
The breach of the suspended sentence requires full restoration of the sentence unless there are exceptional circumstances, which are lacking in this case. It is a serious breach, for the reasons already explained, as well as the fact that the offending in each case was so similar.
Ms Callaghan on your behalf submitted that a combination of factors amount to exceptional circumstances in your case, with the delay between the breach offending and the breach proceedings being one factor. Ms Callaghan pointed out that the breach offending ceased in July 2022, but the breach was not charged until 31 January 2024. One month later the suspended sentence expired.
It is now slightly more than two years since that expiration, some five years after the imposition of the order. That is a significant delay and there is authority for not restoring a suspended sentence in such a case.
The other delay is between the index offending from August 2011 to August 2012, to the charging and prosecution of that matter, and the overall span of time from 13 years ago until now.
Another factor is your deteriorating mental health since the imposition of the suspended sentence, to which I have already referred. Ms Callaghan submitted that a further separate consideration is your evolved insight into the trauma you experienced during your childhood and adolescence, which compounded the experience of trauma within your marriage. She suggested that these matters enliven the Bugmy[2] principles, the foundations for which were not apparent when you were previously sentenced.
The prosecution submissions as to the lack of exceptional circumstances rely in part on the fact that some aspects of delay and of compromised mental health were taken into account in imposing the suspended sentence, in addition to your psychological frailty and the likely difficult experience of prison. I take that submission to mean that the circumstances are rendered unexceptional, by having been taken into account already.
The prosecution also noted that the delay was caused in part by your failure to appear, your request for adjournments and the issues you had in obtaining legal representation. It was apparent that you experienced great difficulty in facing the reality of the court proceedings, but this may have been in no small part due to your difficulties in obtaining financial material required by Victoria Legal Aid, and this can be partly sheeted home to your lack of agency in your marriage, and the financial control and coercion to which you were subjected by your husband.
[5]
In the absence of exceptional circumstances, I will restore the sentence fully, but shall order considerable concurrency to reflect the mitigating circumstances which are apparent from your history and other factors with which you still struggle.
I have already indicated the application of the principle in the case of Bugmy, which must result in reduction of your moral culpability. Ms Callaghan also submitted that Verdins[3] principles apply in a limited way, relying on the opinion of Ms Cokorilo that your untreated psychopathology reduced your ability to think clearly and exercise balanced judgment.[4] These submissions were not opposed by the prosecution.
Even so, as I have already noted, Ms Cokorilo considered your executive functioning was preserved and your reasoning capacity was intact, so you knew the difference between right and wrong, hence the limited application of the Verdins principles as to moral culpability.
It appears that you have developed some insight into the causes of your behaviour, and you are ashamed and remorseful. At the time of the plea, you had not told your family about it. You will not be available to help your elderly mother with the daily care that you have been providing, nor to help with your grandchildren, and I take into account the anguish that this will cause you.
It is difficult to assess your likely prospects for rehabilitation in the circumstances of repeat offending, save to say that there appears to be some developing insight, and you intend to use your time in prison as an opportunity for change. You understand that you can never again work in finance and are motivated to equip yourself for alternative employment.
Having pleaded guilty and avoided a trial, you are entitled to a discount on your sentence. The delay does not interfere with this entitlement. I also accept it as an indication of remorse, which you have expressed.
You have not been in custody before, and your mental health problems may be exacerbated by imprisonment, which is recognised by the enlivening of the Verdins principles.
In restoring fully the suspended sentence, I must consider the principles of totality and parsimony in the context of all the mitigating factors, and the fact that no other sentence would be appropriate.
The orders are as follows:
The three year suspended sentence will be fully restored;
For the charge of theft against Spence Doors, you are sentenced to four years' imprisonment.
For the breach of the suspended sentence you are sentenced to two months' imprisonment.
The three year sentence will be the base sentence for purposes of cumulation. I order that one year of the sentence for the charge on the current indictment be served in cumulation upon the base sentence. The two month sentence will be served concurrently.
The results in a total effective sentence of four years. I order that you serve two years and six months before being eligible for parole. That would allow for a considerable parole period during which you could benefit from the opportunity to effectively address your mental health in ways which you did not do while on the suspended sentence.
If you had pleaded not guilty, I would have sentenced you to five years with a non-parole period of three years.
You have been in pre-sentence detention now for 15 days, that does include today.
Are there any other matters which I have omitted or neglected?
COUNSEL: No, Your Honour.
HER HONOUR: Ms Callahan?
MS CALLAGHAN: May it please the court. Thank you, Your Honour.
HER HONOUR: Nothing further? Thank you.
[6]
[2]Bugmy v the Queen [2013] 249 CLR 571 ('Bugmy').