STATE OF TASMANIA v BEVEN JOHN GLEESON 22 MAY 2019
COMMENTS ON PASSING SENTENCE BLOW CJ
Mr Gleeson has pleaded guilty to two charges of recklessly discharging a firearm. In the early evening of 27 February 2017, he fired a shotgun twice towards a house in the Launceston suburb of Mayfield. The pellets from the first shot hit a step in front of the front door. The pellets from the second shot passed through the front door, travelled nearly five metres along a hallway, and struck a child’s kitchen play centre and the wall behind it. By pleading guilty to the charges, Mr Gleeson has acknowledged that he fired the weapon both times “recklessly and/or without due regard to the safety of other persons and/or property”.
At the time of this incident, Mr Gleeson’s father and step-mother were living in Mayfield. There were ongoing tensions between them and some of their neighbours. There had been a series of unpleasant incidents when they had been threatened and their property had been damaged. The house where the shots were fired was apparently occupied by a couple who were on the other side of the neighbourhood feud. Mr Gleeson made a threat to the man of that house to the effect that he would fight people, one on one without weapons. That man told his step-son. On the evening in question, the step-son arrived in a car with three other young men. They parked in the street and got out of the car, ready to fight. One of them called out to Mr Gleeson. He over-reacted. He emerged from his father’s home with the loaded shotgun. His enemies scattered and hid. The man from the house where the shots were fired ran out his back door, ran to another property, and hid under a caravan. Mr Gleeson fired the two shots in quick succession, returned to his father’s home, got into his car, and drove off.
The shooting was reported to the police by a number of concerned neighbours. Mr Gleeson was found at his home by the police at 10.15pm that night, arrested, charged and held in custody.
There is no reason for me to think that the first shot might have struck anybody. It no doubt caused alarm to a number of people as no one could have known how the incident was likely to end, but the only damage was damage to a doorstep, which was left with about 100 impact marks from small sized shot. The firing of the second shot was a far more dangerous act. Whilst it was likely that no one would have been in the front hall of the house after the first shot, there remained a chance that somebody, perhaps a child, might have been in that hallway at the wrong time. The child’s kitchen play centre was left with about 116 separate shot impact marks, and there were about another 62 shot impact marks in the plaster wall behind it.
Mr Gleeson was 28 years old on the day in question and is now 30. He has a long and bad record of prior convictions. As a youth, he was sentenced to periods of detention on several occasions, commencing when he was 14 years old. As an adult, he had been sentenced to imprisonment on five occasions before the day in question. He has 15 convictions for assault, one for assaulting a police officer, and one for aggravated armed robbery. That crime involved a knife, not a gun. He had no convictions relating to firearms at the time of this incident, but was on bail on a large number of charges, including a charge of possessing a firearm part in October 2016.
He commenced using cannabis when he was 12 years old. He subsequently became a user of amphetamine, methylamphetamine and diazepam. Many of his convictions relate to drug offences and drug-related crimes of dishonesty. He has spent much of his adult life in prison. His partner has described him as institutionalised.
After his arrest on the day in question, Mr Gleeson spent the next 14 months in custody. In April 2017 a magistrate sentenced him in relation to 35 offences that he committed in a period of about four months in late 2016. He received four cumulative sentences of imprisonment, the first of which was backdated to 28 February 2017, the day after his arrest. He was released on 26 April 2018, with bail on the charges that I am now dealing with.
He served a 14-day sentence of imprisonment with effect from 20 July 2018 in relation to some drug offences and four breaches of bail conditions committed in June and July 2018. He re-offended, was arrested on 8 October 2018, and has been in custody ever since. In January 2019, a magistrate sentenced him to nine months’ imprisonment with effect from 6 October 2018 in relation to 23 offences committed in August, September and October. Those offences included a series of firearm offences committed on the day of his arrest. He had a shortened double barrelled shotgun and four shotgun cartridges in his possession. Amongst other things, he pleaded guilty to possessing a loaded firearm in a vehicle in a public place. But for the charges that I am dealing with, he would have been released from prison last month, on 5 April. The sentence I impose today will therefore be backdated to commence on 6 April.
During the periods that Mr Gleeson has been at liberty over the last few years, he has formed a relationship with a partner who may well succeed in keeping him out of trouble. They have a child who is now 2 years old. His partner has two older children. She is a qualified drug and alcohol counsellor. In the past she has worked as a teacher’s assistant and teacher’s aide. At present she works at night, doing cleaning work and other work while Mr Gleeson’s father looks after the children. She has a high opinion of Mr Gleeson, and is committed to helping him to make a fresh start and to lead a stable family-based life.
Mr Gleeson has experience doing boilermaking and welding work. A former employer, who considers him to be a hard worker, is willing to give him work as a trades assistant once he is released from prison. He is an accomplished cricketer and footballer, respected by his coaches. At times in the past he has been able to commit himself to training in those sports, and to maintain a good standard of sportsmanship.
His counsel told me that, when he was on bail last year, he convened a meeting at Mayfield, at which the issues that were the subject of the neighbourhood feud were settled.
Mr Gleeson is entitled to a sentencing discount because he pleaded guilty to the two charges. He pleaded guilty at a very late stage, when the Court was ready to empanel a jury for his trial, and the jury panel were in attendance. However he saved the cost and inconvenience of a trial. I also see it as significant that this case resolved as a result of last minute preparations by the State. On the day before the trial was originally due to start, defence counsel was provided with a statement from an eye witness who had not previously been willing to co-operate. As a result of Mr Gleeson learning of the evidence that that witness was expected to give, his counsel took appropriate steps and the result was a change of plea. In those circumstances, I think a sentencing reduction of the order of 15% is appropriate.
I think it is fair to say that the number and range of offences that Mr Gleeson committed when he was on bail last year indicate that his partner might not be immediately successful in her efforts to rehabilitate him once he is next released from prison. However, because of the possibility of reform, and because of the amount of time Mr Gleeson has spent in custody on other matters since the shooting incident, I will impose the shortest possible non-parole period, and leave it to the Parole Board to decide when it is appropriate to release him.
I have to sentence Mr Gleeson for crimes that were impulsive, but which involved him recklessly discharging a shotgun into a house where there was some risk that someone could have been shot. The only appropriate penalty is a significant sentence of imprisonment.
Beven John Gleeson, I convict you and sentence you to 23 months’ imprisonment with effect from 6 April 2019. You will not be eligible for parole until you have served 11½ months of this sentence.