STATE OF TASMANIA v JORDAN THOMAS RILEY 17 MARCH 2021
COMMENTS ON PASSING SENTENCE PEARCE J
Jordan Riley, you plead guilty to assault and attempting to commit aggravated robbery. I will also deal with your plea of guilty to resisting police. On 29 July 2020 you were in a public park in Launceston. You were there with your younger cousin. He approached a male also in the same park, confronted him with repeated demands for money, and then threw a punch at him which the complainant managed to block. You then approached the same male and joined in the assault. You punched the man a number of times to the head and upper body, causing him to fall to the ground. When you eventually stopped the assault the complainant attempted to leave the park. Even as he was doing so your young cousin repeatedly kept trying to punch him, although you are not responsible for his conduct.
After leaving the park the complainant walked to an ATM some blocks away intending to obtain money to catch a bus home. You and your associate came upon him again. After seeing that he had $20 your associate, in your company, demanded he hand it over. When he said that he needed it to catch the bus he walked towards the bus stop. Your associate followed and committed a further serious assault, leaving the complainant bloodied and requiring assistance. The violence was aimed at intimidating the complainant to hand over his money, although he did not do so. It is not asserted that you said anything. You did not go particularly close to or apply any force to the complainant at the time of the attempted robbery, but you plead guilty on the basis that you admit that, by your presence, and knowing what was going on, you encouraged your cousin to attempt to commit the robbery and you thus abetted him.
Much of this was captured on CCTV. You were identified and arrested at your home on 1 August 2020. You became aggressive and physically confronted the two arresting officers. You resisted by pushing and thrashing around. You wrestled both officers on the ground before you were eventually restrained.
The complainant was aged 33 at the time. As a result of the various acts of violence he had two swollen and blackened eyes, an injury to his upper nose and to his lip. It is not clear whether the injuries were caused by you or your associate, but I am satisfied from the nature of the blows you imparted that you caused some injury to those areas. Fortunately the complainant’s injuries were not long lasting but the incident was upsetting for him, and he is very relieved, because you have pleaded guilty, and he will not be required to attend court. It is not a particularly early plea but ultimately you facilitated justice. The complainant, and the community in general, are entitled to be protected from violent attacks of this nature committed seemingly at random and in public.
You are now aged 19. Despite your relative youth you have a long record of offending which starts when you were 14 and has involved progressively more serious offences since then. You have been sentenced and re-sentenced many times for offences of dishonesty and violence, and anti-social offences, too numerous to list. In 2017 you were sentenced to partly suspended detention for aggravated armed robbery. In 2018 you were sentenced to detention for robbery and assault. In 2019 you were sentenced to imprisonment for 2½ years from 2 February 2019 for aggravated assault, stealing and two counts of armed robbery. On that occasion you robbed the same service station twice on the same day, on each occasion using a firearm. Six months of that term were suspended for three years. Later in 2019 you were sentenced to a concurrent term of detention for three counts of stealing and one count of unlawfully destroying property.
You were released on parole on 27 July 2020. These crimes were committed only two days later. You were not only subject to parole but to the suspended part of the sentence, which you thereby breached. I must activate that sentence unless satisfied it is unjust, and there is no proper basis on which I could reach that conclusion.
You are a young indigenous man who comes from a background of considerable deprivation. I have a pre-sentence report dated 10 March 2021. It reports that when in the community you associate with others involved with crime and drug use. You have heavily abused drugs and, to a lesser extent, alcohol since your early teens. You have never, in any meaningful way, engaged with the many attempts to assist you to address the factors which lead you to crime and you remain unmotivated to do so. You have little insight into the impact of your conduct, in particular the type of violence you displayed on this occasion. It is very difficult to see what a sentencing court can do to break the cycle of offending and re-offending you have fallen into. Over the years attempts have been made to discourage you from crime by suspending all or part of detention or prison, and to assist you through community based orders. However such orders have mostly been breached by more offences. Each time you are released you quickly re-offend. Despite the high level of support which was put in place prior to your most recent release, you committed these crimes after only two days. The only mitigating factors are your pleas of guilty and your youth, although the latter factor is now largely overtaken by your record. It can only be hoped that as you grow older, you mature and change your attitude. Unless you do, you are destined to spend much of your life in prison.
A further term of imprisonment is inevitable. Despite all of the factors I have mentioned, the author of the pre-sentence report suggests another attempt at community-based orders. For that reason I have fashioned an overall sentencing order which allows for that. You have been in custody since 1 August 2020, but your parole was revoked and the period of custody until 6 February 2021 is attributable to the balance of the earlier two year sentence. The sentence I am to impose will commence on that day. I take into account the total effect of the sentence I am about to impose taken with the long period of custody you have already served. However you are to be sentenced for new offending.
Jordan Riley, you are convicted on both counts on the indictment and on count 1 on complaint 33581/20. The suspended six month term of the sentence imposed on 14 March 2019 is activated and I order that you serve that term from 6 February 2021. I order that you not be eligible for parole until you have served four months of that term. On the indictment, count 1, you are sentenced to imprisonment for nine months cumulative to the term just activated. I order that you not be eligible for parole until you have served six months of that term. On count 2 on the indictment and on count 1 on the complaint, I impose one sentence. You are sentenced to imprisonment for six months. I wholly suspend that term for 18 months from your release. It is a condition of that order that while it is in force you do not commit any offence punishable by imprisonment. If you breach that condition then a court must order that you serve that term unless it is unjust. I impose two further conditions. Firstly that during the period the order is in force, you are to be subject to the supervision of a probation officer. The second further condition is that, within the operational period of 18 months from your release you perform 49 hours of community service. The conditions which the law imposes on the orders which I have made include that you must report to a probation officer at 111-113 Cameron Street, Launceston within one clear working day of your release, you must, during the operational period of the order, report to a probation officer as required by the probation officer and comply with the reasonable and lawful directions of a probation officer or a supervisor, you must not, during the operational period of the order, leave, or remain outside, Tasmania without the permission of a probation officer, and you must, during the operational period of the order, give notice to a probation officer of any change of address or employment before, or within two working days after, the change. I impose special conditions that you must, during the operational period of the order, submit to the supervision of a probation officer as required by the probation officer, attend educational and other programs, undergo assessment and treatment for alcohol or drug dependency, submit to testing for alcohol or drug use and submit to medical, psychological or psychiatric assessment or treatment as directed by a probation officer. If you breach any of those conditions you may be brought back to court and re-sentenced.
I declare that the total effect of the orders I have made is that you are sentenced to a total term of imprisonment of 21 months from 6 February 2021. You will be required to serve a total operative term of 15 months from 6 February 2021 and you are not eligible to apply for parole until you have served 10 months of that term. The balance six month term is suspended for 18 months from your release on the conditions I have stated.