DPP v RC [2025] VSC 406

1. These reasons relate to the sentence to be imposed for your breach on 28 May 2025 of the terms of a Supervision Order made under the Serious Offenders Act 2018.

Background to the making of the Supervision Order

1. In March 2013, you stabbed a person on a tram in Port Melbourne using a large 'hunting or commando' knife. You were sentenced to a term of five years imprisonment for recklessly causing serious injury.
2. In February 2018, you assaulted your neighbour on two occasions. You were sentenced to a term of three years imprisonment for aggravated burglary, intentionally causing injury and breaching parole.
3. On 7 February 2022, a Supervision Order was made following a determination by Beale J that you pose 'an unacceptable risk of committing... a serious violence offence... if a supervision order is not made and [you are] in the community'.[1] That Supervision Order was reviewed and varied on 5 October 2023 by Croucher J. On 15 April 2025, Champion J determined that the Supervision Order should not be revoked, and ordered that it remain in force until 6 February 2027.

1. On the morning of 28 May 2025, police officers attended your residence in Preston for the purposes of monitoring your compliance with the Supervision Order. They observed a male get out of a parked car and walked into a house opposite your residence that was known by police to be a location of 'high drug activity'. Shortly after, police officers saw you walk from your residence into that house, then, a few minutes later, you return to your residence and the male go back to his car.
2. The police officers spoke to you and conducted a search of your person and your residence. In your jacket pocket, police officers located and seized a packaged syringe and a small zip lock bag containing methylamphetamine.
3. You were arrested and taken to Heidelberg Police Station, where you participated in a 'no comment' record of interview.
4. You were charged with one count of contravening a supervision order, contrary to s 169(1) of the Serious Offenders Act 2018, namely by breaching condition 4.5 of the Supervision Order. Condition 4.5 of the Supervision Order provides that:

[RC] must not use or possess prohibited drugs (including synthetic drugs), obtain drugs unlawfully or abuse drugs of any kind.

1. That charge has been transferred to this Court for hearing. You submit, and the prosecution does not oppose, that the matter be heard and determined summarily pursuant to s 174(1) of the Serious Offenders Act 2018. I agree that this is appropriate and have ordered that the charge be heard summarily, and you have pleaded guilty to that charge.

1. A breach of s 169(1) of the Serious Offenders Act 2018 is punishable by a maximum penalty of five years imprisonment or a fine of 600 penalty units, that is, $118,554.[2] As this matter is being heard and determined summarily, the maximum sentence that may be imposed is two years imprisonment or a fine of 500 penalty units, that is, $98,795.
2. You are now 45 years old. You have, at present, access to stable housing, and are in receipt of welfare payments through Centrelink. You have diagnoses of schizoaffective disorder and anti-social personality disorder, and are currently subject to a Community Treatment Order imposed under the Mental Health and Wellbeing Act 2022 which requires you to comply with a medication regime of anti-psychotics and mood stabilisers.
3. Your criminal record reveals a long and troubling history of violence: recklessly cause injury and assault by kicking in or about 2008; three counts of unlawful assault and assault by kicking in or about 2011; recklessly cause serious injury in or about 2013; unlawful assault and assault by kicking in or about 2013; intentionally cause serious injury in or about 2018; and intentionally cause serious injury in or about 2022.
4. Of more immediate significance, you have contravened the Supervision Order on nine previous occasions, and on four occasions the contravention has been associated with the possession or use of prohibited drugs. This, your tenth contravention, is a serious matter. Any sentence imposed must adequately take into account the need to deter you from again breaching the Supervision Order. The previous sentences seemingly have not had that effect. Not only is it important that you comply with the Supervision Order, but the risk of you engaging in violence is more likely to materialise in the context of any drug use by you - that is the reason for which the Supervision Order was made. Further, the contravention of any Supervision Order is a serious matter[3] and general deterrence is an important consideration if the supervision order regime is to be effective.[4]
5. That said, it is important also to balance the need for deterrence against the secondary purpose of the Serious Offenders Act 2018, being to 'facilitate the treatment and rehabilitation' of persons subjected to supervision orders.[5] Your rehabilitation is not only in your interest, but would also best promote the protection of other members of society.
6. Further:

(a) While in the community, you have been participating in drug and alcohol counselling on a monthly basis and, I am prepared to accept, have been accepting of daily mood stabilising and anti-psychotic medication;

(b) You have indicated a willingness to increase your attendance to fortnightly, which suggests that you have a level of insight into the need for you to address your prohibited drug use;

(c) This contravention was not associated with any violent conduct by you;

(d) It is over 11 months since you were last sentenced for a breach of your Supervision Order, and I have no reason to believe that you have not otherwise complied with the conditions of that Supervision Order;

(e) You have pleaded guilty at the earliest opportunity and should therefore be afforded a discount on any sentence imposed by this Court, in recognition of the utilitarian value of that plea and of your acceptance of responsibility for your offending; and

(f) You spent 40 days in custody between 22 March 2024 to 30 April 2024 after being arrested and charged with contraventions of the Supervision Order. Those charges were later withdrawn. This period of time in custody should be taken into account as 'dead time' in accordance with the Renzella discretion in determining an appropriate sentence, this being the first available opportunity for the Court to take that period of detention into account while sentencing.[6]

1. The prosecution submits, and you concede, that a term of imprisonment is warranted. I agree. Your counsel has submitted that any term of imprisonment should not exceed your time served.
2. RC would you please stand.
3. Having regard to the need for specific and general deterrence and the need to mark the seriousness of offending against conditions imposed by Supervision Orders, but considering also the other matters referred to above, I sentence you to a term of imprisonment of 26 days, being the amount of time served by you as pre-sentence detention. I state, for the purposes of s 6AAA of the Sentencing Act 1991, that but for your plea of guilty, I would have sentenced you to six weeks imprisonment.
4. Pursuant to s 18(4) of the Sentencing Act 1991, I declare that you have served a total of 26 days of pre-sentence detention (up to but not including 23 June 2025) and I direct that this be reckoned as time already served under the current sentence.
5. But for the 'dead time' of 40 days referred to above, I would have imposed a greater period of imprisonment and you must not assume that, should you offend again, you will not be sentenced to a term of imprisonment beyond the period of time served by the time that your plea is heard.

[1] Serious Offenders Act 2018 (Vic) s 14(1).

[2] Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic) s 109(3).

[3] Director of Public Prosecutions v SM [2019] VSC 466, [11] (Elliot J); Director of Public Prosecutions v SJW [2020] VSC 746, [36] (Tinney J); R v Ta [2021] VSC 479, [9] (Taylor J).

[4] Acting Secretary to the Department of Justice v McKane [2012] VSC 459, [21] (Williams J); Director of Public Prosecutions v SJW [2020] VSC 746, [25] (Tinney J); Director of Public Prosecutions v XG [2023] VSC 127, [23]-[24], [46] (Croucher J); Director of Public Prosecutions v DW [2023] VSC 143, [30] (Lasry J).

[5] Serious Offenders Act 2018 (Vic) s 1(b); Director of Public Prosecutions v XG [2023] VSC 127, [62].

[6] R v Renzella [1997] 2 VR 88, 97-98.