IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA
AT Melbourne
CRIMINAL DIVISION	Revised
Not Restricted
Suitable for Publication	
Case No. CR-21-01120

DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS		
		
v		
		
DAYMION GURU		

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JUDGE:	HIS HONOUR JUDGE MEREDITH	
WHERE HELD:	Melbourne	
DATE OF HEARING:	27 October 2021	
DATE OF SENTENCE:	15 November 2021	
CASE MAY BE CITED AS:	DPP v Guru	
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION:	[2021] VCC 1824		

REASONS FOR SENTENCE
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Subject:		Attempted armed robbery, burglary and others
Catchwords: 		Drug-fuelled; bizarre offending; youthful offender; 
		substantial rehabilitation undertaken
Legislation Cited:	
Cases Cited:	
Sentence:		Combination sentence 109 days’ imprisonment with 18-month  
	Community Correction Order
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APPEARANCES:
	Counsel	Solicitors	
For the Director of Public Prosecutions	Ms H. Edwards	Solicitor for the Director of Public Prosecutions	
			
For the Accused	Mr J. Barreiro
(For Plea)

Mr A. Paul
(For Sentence)	Adrian Paul & Associates Solicitors	

HIS HONOUR:

1	Mr Daymion Guru, you have pleaded guilty to a total of 10 charges on indictment and four related summary offences, all of which were committed over an approximately 24-hour period on 28 and 29 August.
2	On indictment you have pleaded guilty to three charges of burglary, namely Charges 1, 2 and 5.  You have also pleaded guilty to two charges of theft, Charges 4 and 7.  The offences of burglary and theft each carry a maximum penalty of 10 years’ imprisonment.  You have also pleaded guilty to two charges of damaging property, namely Charges 3 and 10, and to one charge of attempted theft, namely Charge 6, and one charge of attempted burglary, Charge 9, each of these offences carry a maximum penalty of 5 years’ imprisonment.  You have pleaded guilty to one charge of attempted armed robbery, being Charge 8, which has a maximum penalty of 20 years’ imprisonment.
3	The four summary offences are committing an offence on bail, dealing with property suspected of being the proceeds of crime, and two charges of trespass.
4	The related summary offence of offending whilst on bail has a maximum penalty of 3 months’ imprisonment and dealing with property suspected of being the proceeds of crime, a maximum of 2 years’ imprisonment.  The offence of trespass carries a maximum penalty of 6 months’ imprisonment.
5	A prosecution opening was read into evidence at the hearing of your matter and it has not been the subject of any dispute.  Accordingly, I will summarise the circumstances of your offending more briefly.
6	At the time of your offending, you were 20 years of age and are now 21.  You had been released on bail at the Geelong Magistrates’ Court on 17 July 2020 for unrelated matters.  At the time of your offending, you were residing in a 
self-contained Airbnb unit within the garage of a residence in Normandy Crescent, Ocean Grove.  Your mother had booked the unit for you.
7	Also on this property was a house where the owner, Mr Jacobs, and his family lived.  Inside and next to the front door of this residence was an electrical switchboard which you had been shown in case the power to your unit switched off.  Save for turning the power back on via the switchboard, you were not permitted to enter Mr Jacob and his family’s residence uninvited.
8	Your offending comprises eight incidences over an approximately 24-hour period all of which occurred in close proximity to the Airbnb unit that you were residing in.  You appear to have been significantly drug affected throughout the whole of the episode.
9	Incident 1 concerns Summary Charge 16 of trespass and involves you at approximately 2:30 in the morning on Friday, 28 August 2021, attending a residential property in Fontaine Street of Ocean Grove.  Ms Lakey and her four young children were inside the house at the time.  Ms Lakey was in her bedroom having double French doors opening onto her backyard.  You entered the back yard of the property with a torch.  Ms Lakey heard something moving outside of her bedroom and a torch light flash across her French doors and she then called out, “Who’s there?”.  You were heard to reply, “I'm just looking for my dog.  If you find it, call Damien.”  You then jumped over the fence into a neighbour’s back yard.  
10	The second incident comprising Charge 1 of burglary, involves you entering the next-door property of Paula Ryan.  On this property is a residential dwelling and a separate detached glasshouse which was primarily used to house exercise equipment and storage boxes.  You entered the glass house and commenced rummaging through some of the boxes containing personal belongings.  You were disturbed by Ms Ryan’s two dogs that were barking.  You then left the glasshouse.  Ms Ryan, who had been asleep, was by this stage woken by the sound of her barking dogs.  She went to let the dogs into the house through the laundry which opens onto her back yard.  On opening the laundry door, she saw you being bailed up outside by one of her dogs.  She asked, “What are you doing?”; you replied that you were looking for your dog.  You were questioned as to where you lived and said you were staying at an Airbnb in Normandy Street.  You were told that, “You best get out of here before I ring the police”.  You then went to climb over the fence and Ms Ryan told you, “No, there’s a gate over there.  Get going or I'll call the police.”
11	Ms Ryan then woke her husband and the two of them went for a drive to see if you were still in the vicinity.  They were aware of the Airbnb property and drove to it and spoke to Mr Jacobs informing him of what had occurred.  Mr Jacobs confirmed that he did not own the particular type of dog which you had identified and that neither of his dogs had escaped.
12	At about 3:00 am after Mr and Ms Ryan had departed, Mr Jacobs heard you loudly playing music in your unit.  Mr Jacobs went to tell you to turn it off and he discovered you passed out on your bed.  Mr Jacobs then cut the power to your unit.
13	Incident 3 comprises Charge 2 of burglary.  Between 3:00 and 8:40 am, you again left the unit, this time attending a property in Cantal Court in Ocean Grove.  There is a residential dwelling on this property being the home of Ms Hann‑Woodlock and also a detached garage and a separate shed which houses her pottery studio.  You entered the pottery studio and found a can of spray paint.  You then proceeded to graffiti multiple walls inside the shed with what are described as indecipherable text and symbols.  You opened a few boxes which contained various pots, removed a Wi-Fi modem and put it into a shopping basket and took the shopping basket into the garage.  You then opened the roller door of the garage, leaving the property and leaving the basket with the modem inside the garage.
14	Incident 4 comprises Charge 4 of theft, Charge 5 of burglary, Charge 6 of attempted theft and Charge 7 of theft.  This involves you departing your unit between 3:00 am and 9:30 pm and attending a property in Belle Vue Drive, Ocean Grove.  On this property there is a residential dwelling which is the home of Isaac Marshall as well as a separate garage.  Mr Marshall’s Mazda was also parked on the street outside of his property.  You by unknown means were able to gain access to the inside of the Mazda and you there removed a wallet containing cards and documents and two keys belonging to Mr Marshall.  You then entered the garage on the property, and parked inside the garage was a Holden motor vehicle.  You gained access to this and discovered keys on the dash.  You forced the keys in the ignition of the Holden in an attempt to start it.  Unknown to you, however, the keys were for the roof racks which were attached to the vehicle and you then left the key jammed in the ignition exiting the vehicle.  You then came across two bicycles in the garage and removed one from the garage, abandoning it on the side of the property.  The second bike, a Trek Madone, was removed from the garage.  You left the property with this bicycle, wallet and two sets of keys returning you to your unit.
15	Incident 5 comprises Summary Charge 19 of trespass.  This concerns you between 9:30 and 10:00 pm that evening entering Mr Jacobs’ house and walking past the switchboard into his daughter’s bedroom.  You told his daughter that the power had gone out in your unit.  Mr Jacobs was alerted and he then checked the switchboard seeing that the power had not gone off.  He told you, “There’s nothing wrong with the power”, and removed you from the house.
16	Incident 6 comprising the offence of attempted armed robbery, namely Charge 8, concerns you at approximately 10:00 pm coming across Mr Raoul D’Cruz who was walking his dog along Belle Vue Drive in Ocean Grove.  Mr D’Cruz had walked the length of the drive to a dead end and was turning around to walk back home.  When approaching the corner with Normandy Crescent, he saw you emerge from a thick clump of trees approximately 20 metres ahead of him.  You started to walk toward him and Mr D’Cruz saw you say something but could not hear what you were saying as he was wearing headphones.  You proceeded to follow Mr D’Cruz and he engaged you in conversation.  You asked him for money and when he said he had none, you responded, “What do ya mean, you have a phone, surely you’ve got something”.  Mr D’Cruz continued walking and you continued following him, saying, “Give me some money”.  Further interjections occurred with it culminating and you walking towards Mr D’Cruz until you were standing approximately 1.5 metres away from him.  You then pulled a steel rachet from your pants, holding it down and then slowly thrusting it toward Mr D’Cruz in what he took to be a threatening manner.  Mr D’Cruz started to jog away from you.  You then ran after Mr D’Cruz, saying, “Don’t run”, and, “Do you want to see a gun?”.  Mr D’Cruz ultimately told you that he had called police, telling you, “The police are on their way”.  This saw you then ran off.
17	Incident 7 concerning Charge 9 of attempted burglary and Summary Charge 3 of committing an indictable offence while on bail concerns you at about 11:00 pm returning to Ms Lakey’s property.  Her husband was home.  Both of them were asleep in their bedroom when you approached the French doors and tried to open them.  The sound of the handle turning woke Ms Lakey up who then woke her husband and said, “He’s back”, and, “He’s trying to get in the door”.  Her husband then stood by the door yelling at you, “What the fuck are you doing here?  Fuck off, I'm going to call the police.”  You responded, “I'm just looking for my dog”, and ultimately fled the property.
18	Incident 8 comprising Charge 10 of damaging property and Summary Charge 11 of dealing with property suspected of being the proceeds of crime concerns the police arriving at Ms Lakey’s property as a result of she and her husband having contacted them.  At about 1:05 am on 29 August, a police Dog Squad animal tracked your scent from Fontaine Street to the Airbnb where you were residing.  Police were then directed to your unit and you were arrested inside and transported to the Geelong Police Station.  A search was conducted and a knife was observed to be protruding from a wall and graffiti sprayed across a mirror in the bathroom.  The Trek Madone bicycle, the wallet, cards and documentation stolen from Mr Marshall and two watches were located.
19	When interviewed you made a number of admissions after the interview had been suspended to give you time to come to your senses.  Initially you were rambling and barely coherent.
20	With respect to the burglary and thefts from Mr Marshall, you claimed that you went with a friend called Brod and you were on the lookout for him.  Independent inquiries have been conducted and the person you identified as Brod was in custody at that time.  With respect to the offence of attempted armed robbery, you said, “I chased him for, like, five minutes.  Cause I thought he was gunna call the cops.  Because I look suspicious.”  You admitted having a socket wrench on you at the time and you claimed that you thought it fell out while you were trying to chase your victim.  You claimed you were looking for a dog and that you were in a shit mood.  You said you would rather have nice things and you would rather have a nice phone and you said you saw your victim run and then you stopped.  You said, “I thought I could have chased him … I could have taken what he had but I'm not like that.  Mum has raised me to be a better person.”  You said, “I was really Xannied last night, I don’t remember much at all.”
21	Regarding Ms Lakey’s property, you said you recall being in that lady’s yard and asking, “Excuse me, is anyone home?”.  You recalled her saying that you had to leave or she would call the police and with respect to the damage caused to the unit where you were staying and the stolen watches located therein, you said that the knife was in the wall for practice and regarding the property, you said, “All the stolen shit was on the couch”.
22	A victim impact statement was received from one of your victims and I have had regard to the relevant and admissible contents of that document.  In it the author speaks of his loss of his sense of personal safety and the anxiety which your conduct has caused.  I will have appropriate regard to its contents in reaching my sentence of you.
23	You were remanded in custody on 29 August 2020 and granted bail on 16 December 2020.  Accordingly, you have served 109 days in custody and I will declare these as a period of pre‑sentence detention.
24	By way of your personal background; you were born in Sydney and raised in a tightknit family having one younger brother who is now 13 or thereabouts.  You attended primary school in Sydney showing early academic promise.  As a result of your father’s work, the family moved to Ballarat in 2014 and you commenced secondary schooling there.  You excelled at school and at the age of 15 were offered a scholarship with IBM in conjunction with the Federation University of Ballarat.  Around this time, however, things commenced to go downhill for you.  You report being subjected to bullying at school in part because of your ethnic background and also because of your weight.  There was also a breakdown in the family unit with your parents separating and your father with whom you had been very close leaving the household.  You describe feeling the absence of your father very keenly and his complete departure from your life, ultimately moving interstate.  You then gravitated towards a milieu involving the use of cannabis and prescription medication and ultimately methylamphetamine or ice.  You left school at the end of Year 11 and describe being enmeshed in the drug scene of Ballarat.
25	The prosecution submit that a period of imprisonment not exceeding the 109 days which you have currently served, combined with a Community Correction Order is an appropriate sentencing disposition in your case.  Independently of the prosecutor’s concession, I have come to the same conclusion.  In summary in support of this disposition your counsel emphasised the following matters.
26	Firstly, that whilst some of your offending involves the commission of serious offences, as an example of these your offending falls toward the lower end of the spectrum.  It was unplanned, chaotic and at times outright bizarre.  The submission is made that consistent with what you said in your interview, the nature of the offending demonstrates your disorganised and drug affected state at the time.  Accordingly, it is submitted that as examples of the offences in question yours constitute a lower-level example of these and I agree with this analysis.
27	Secondly it was submitted that whilst you do have relevant prior court appearances, you have not however previously received a term of imprisonment.  That the period which you spent on remand was a salutary lesson for you and it involved you being remanded during the currency of the COVID‑19 pandemic when prisoner restrictions were significant.
28	Thirdly, it was put, and I accept, that over approximately the previous 10 months since you have been released on bail you have made great advances in your own personal rehabilitation.  You are currently working with a bricklaying crew and are about to commence an apprenticeship.  You are drug free and are not facing any further offences.  You have reconciled with your mother and she has provided an insightful reference which speaks of your rehabilitation and the support which is available to you.
29	In regard to this, you come from a prosocial background and have the support in particular of your mother who has been a significant person in your life.
30	Fourthly, you were comparatively speaking young at the time at which you committed your offences and are still a young man.  Your youth is a highly relevant sentencing consideration and consistently with sentencing authority I am required to and will emphasise your personal rehabilitation, whilst having appropriate regard to other sentencing aims.
31	One of the aims which the criminal law seeks to promote is the rehabilitation of young offenders.  If this can be achieved, it is not only of personal benefit to the offender but of benefit to society at large.  In your case, given the significant progress which you have made, I assess your rehabilitative prospects as positive and in part for this reason think it would be counterproductive to return you to prison.  Prison is recognised as being an environment that is not conducive to personal rehabilitation, involving as it may, a young offender mixing with hardened criminals or others who possess antisocial moreys and scant regard for the law.  This would also place your bricklaying apprenticeship in jeopardy and potentially return you and expose you to an environment not conducive toward your personal rehabilitation.  In short, it may lead to the undoing of much of the progress which you have made.
32	Fifthly, you have pleaded guilty at what is comparatively speaking an early stage.  In light of your plea of guilty and on the whole of the materials before me, I accept that you are now appropriately remorseful.  Your plea of guilty has facilitated the course of justice and is of added value given that it takes place during the currency of the COVID-19 pandemic when jury trials had been suspended withing this State in metropolitan Melbourne.
33	In the lead up to your offending you were abusing drugs, socially isolated and somewhat estranged from your mother.  Your position now has stabilised and you appear committed to your work and to leaving your drug taking past behind you.
34	In light of these factors, I am of the view that a Community Correction Order with appropriate conditions will adequately foster your personal rehabilitation but also address the need for deterrence and punishment of you.  In order to achieve this, on the offence of attempted armed robbery, I propose to sentence you to 109 days in prison which I will declare as pre‑sentence detention, in combination with a Community Correction Order of 18 months' duration.  This order will have the following special conditions.
35	That you perform 100 hours of unpaid community work, within the first 12 months of the order.  That you be supervised for the first 12 months of the order and that during the currency of the order, you submit for testing and treatment with respect to drug abuse, and your mental health as required.  In addition, you are to participate as appropriate in courses aimed at reducing the risk of your reoffending.
36	In light of the fact that you will be in paid employment pursuing your apprenticeship, I have reduced the number of unpaid work hours that I otherwise would have imposed on you.  I do not wish to jeopardise your employment as I recognise your continued employment is a protective factor against you lapsing into further offending.
37	In regard to the Community Correction Order, you must understand that if you do breach it either by non-compliance or by the commission of a further offences during its operative period, you will be returned to the Court inevitably before me and amongst a range of powers which I possess, I may resentence you on the offence on which I have released you on the order.
38	Given that this sentencing hearing is taking place over an internet platform, I will not require you to sign a Community Correction Order acknowledgment but I will consider you to be bound by the conditions of the order if you verbally indicate you are prepared to undertake the order.
39	OFFENDER:  Yep.
40	HIS HONOUR:  Are you prepared to do the order, Mr Guru?
41	OFFENDER:  Yes, I am.  Yep.
42	HIS HONOUR:  All right.
43	In regard to the other offences, I will impose terms of imprisonment which will run concurrently with the term I have imposed on the offence of attempted armed robbery and these terms of imprisonment will not exceed the 109 days which I have declared by way of pre‑sentence detention.  The individual sentences then will be as follows.
Charge 	Offence	Sentence	
1	Burglary	3 months	
2	Burglary	3 months	
3	Damage Property	2 months	
4	Theft	1 month	
5	Burglary	3 months	
6	Att Theft	7 days	
7	Theft	1 month	
8	Att Armed Robbery	109 days and CCO	
9	Att burglary	2 months	
10	Damage property	1 month	
RSO			
3 	Commit offence on bail	1 month	
11	Deal property suspected proceeds crime	7 days	
16	Trespass	7 days	
19	Trespass	7 days	

Total Effective sentence 	109 days and CCO	
NPP	Nil	
PSD	109 days	
6AAA declaration	2 years with a 12 months min	

44	Now, each occasion of unpaid work that you undertake, and each attendance at the Office of Corrections should stand as a reminder to you of the nature and wrongfulness of your actions and of the need for you to continue to apply yourself towards your rehabilitation.
45	I also want to congratulate you on the steps which you have taken to date, however, you do need to understand that if you do not take the opportunity which I have given you, and you do further offend, the likely outcome is I will have no choice other than to return you to prison.  If I have to do this, it is unlikely that I will emphasise your personal rehabilitation in the way that I have done in this particular sentence and you need to understand you would be advised to keep up the efforts that you have made to date, otherwise the consequences may be severe for you.
46	OFFENDER:  Okay.
47	HIS HONOUR:  Right.
48	OFFENDER:  Yep.
49	HIS HONOUR:  Now, I will direct please, Mr Paul, that you explain to your client the workings and operation of the Community Correction Order and explain to him the consequences of any breach of the order and I will indicate that but for your plea of guilty in this matter, I would not have considered a combined sentence involving a Community Correction Order and whilst it is highly artificial plucking one matter out in isolation, nonetheless doing the best I can, I would have imposed a term of two years' imprisonment and directed that you not be released before the expiration of 12 months of that period, all right?
50	OFFENDER:  Yep.
51	HIS HONOUR:  Are there any further orders required, Ms Edwards?
52	MS EDWARDS:  There are, Your Honour.  There was a disposal order filed.  I can resend that to your associate.  And there was also on Charge 6 a licence order as required as there is an attempted theft of a motor vehicle.
53	HIS HONOUR:  All right.  Is there a minimum for that?
54	MS EDWARDS:  There is not a minimum on that particular charge.  No, Your Honour.
55	HIS HONOUR:  And is it required that I suspend the licence?
56	MS EDWARDS:  Yes, Your Honour.
57	HIS HONOUR:  Sorry?
58	MS EDWARDS:  Yes, Your Honour.
59	HIS HONOUR:  All right.  All right.  In reaching a term for that licence suspension, I am conscious of the fact that you are in the paid work force and shortly due to undertake an apprenticeship and a licence would be of value to you and is a matter that would assist in your rehabilitation.  So having regard to that, I will direct that your licence be suspended for a seven-day period.
60	OFFENDER:  Sweet.  Thank you.
61	HIS HONOUR:  All right.  All right.  Well, thank you both.  If there is nothing further then, that concludes the proceeding.
62	MS EDWARDS:  Could I just confirm that Your Honour has the disposal order before you?
63	HIS HONOUR:  I am not sure, but my associate will be in contact with you.
64	MS EDWARDS:  Yes, Your Honour.
65	HIS HONOUR:  All right.  It probably is but we can just confirm that.
66	All right.  Thank you.
67	COUNSEL:  As Your Honour pleases.
68	OFFENDER:  Thank you, Your Honour.
69	HIS HONOUR:  Good luck.  I do not want to see you again, Mr Guru.
70	OFFENDER:  You won't.
71	HIS HONOUR:  Yes.
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