IN THE COUNTY COURT 
OF VICTORIA	Revised
Not Restricted
Suitable for Publication	
AT MELBOURNE
CRIMINAL JURISDICTION

CR 20-00141
Indictment No: K12584727.1

DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS		
		
v		
		
JESSIE TRIGG		

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JUDGE:	HIS HONOUR JUDGE TINNEY	
WHERE HELD:	Melbourne	
DATE OF HEARING:	10 July 2020	
DATE OF SENTENCE:	14 July 2020	
CASE MAY BE CITED AS:	DPP v TRIGG	
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION:	[2020] VCC 1027 	

REASONS FOR SENTENCE

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Subject:  aggravated burglary, attempted carjacking, assault emergency worker on duty x 2, summary offences: commit indictable offence on bail x 2, assault with weapon x 2.  31 years old now. Relevant prior criminal history including prison term previously imposed for aggravated burglary.

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APPEARANCES:
	Counsel	Solicitors	
For the Director of Public  Prosecutions	Ms McGarvie	Office of Public Prosecutions	
			
For the Accused	Ms Walker
	Melinda Walker	

HIS HONOUR:  
1	Jessie Trigg, you have pleaded guilty to one charge of aggravated burglary, one charge of attempted carjacking and two charges of assaulting an emergency worker on duty. You have also pleaded guilty to four summary offences, being two charges of assault with a weapon and two charges of committing an indictable offence whilst on bail. The maximum penalties were correctly placed before me. The summary was amended orally to specify that the assault with a weapon offence was in each instance punishable by a two year maximum prison term.  There had been discussion about that issue prior to your plea being taken and your counsel agreed that the higher maximum penalty applied given that it was an assault with a weapon. 
2	You were born on 20 January 1989 and are now 31 years of age.  You have a short but relevant criminal history. 
3	This matter was opened to me on Friday of last week by Ms McGarvie who appeared on behalf of the Director of Public Prosecutions.  She opened in accordance with a written plea opening dated 12 June 2020.  Your counsel Ms Walker told me that it was an agreed statement. For that reason, I do not think it is necessary to provide the full detail of the sentencing facts in my reasons. I will sentence in accordance with that agreed summary. This was serious offending indeed, as is correctly conceded by your counsel.
4	I will deal with the sentencing submissions made to me as to the nature of the assault that you intended at the point of entry. The aggravated burglary is made out whether you intended an actual physical assault or to instil fear or intimidate, without any physical force. By your guilty plea, you admit that at the time of entry, you had the intention to commit an offence involving an assault and had with you a knife. Assault can embrace a physical assault or something less. It will generally be for the Court to make judgements as to the nature of the assault intended by an offender as at the point of entry. I will return to discuss this matter later in these reasons when dealing with the prosecution submissions as to sentence and when assessing the nature and gravity of offending. 
5	Very briefly stated, by the 2nd of October 2019, your relationship with your partner Ms Katie Brock had broken down. You had recently separated. There was an 11 week old child, Anne. On 2nd October 2019 at around 6.30pm, one of Ms Brock’s friends, Ms Penny McCoy attended at your house to collect some of Ms Brock’s  belongings. You questioned her about the location of your child. You attended a short time later at Ms McCoy’s house in Blackburn where Ms Brock had been staying. Ms Brock called the police. You left before they arrived. 
6	The next day, so 3rd October 2019, you went back to that address and that was plainly a dreadful decision. Ms McCoy was home alone and heard your voice from the front of the house. It was around 5.30pm and she saw you get out of a car wearing a black hoodie with the hood pulled up over your head. You were wearing some black rubber gloves. You were carrying a knife in one hand and a can of bourbon in the other. You got out of the car and started to yell out abuse saying amongst other things, “You putrid dog, where are they? I know you are hiding them, you putrid dog”. Ms McCoy shut her front door and you persisted with your abuse. You banged on the window and then entered the lounge room by climbing through an unlocked window which you had opened. You began waving the knife around at Ms McCoy in the front lounge of her house and accused her of taking your child away and hiding the child and the mother inside the house. Ms McCoy was scared by your actions and did not know what you would do to her. She told you that they were not there. You looked around and satisfied yourself of that. You said to her “I’m not going to hurt you”, at one point broke down crying, hugged her and left, saying as you did “Alright we are done, I’m out of here, nice knowing you”
7	Having left the house, you then subjected a 60 year old motorist Mr Kapevic to an extremely frightening experience attempting to carjack him. He had to swerve to avoid hitting you as you had stumbled onto the road. That would have been frightening enough for him. Worse was soon to follow.  He stopped his car. You then went straight to his car, opened the door and dragged him from the car and got in and did your utmost to then take the car. The problem was he had the keys and it had a push button ignition that needed the keys within a certain range. You got increasingly upset about the inability to start the car and got out and ran after him demanding the keys. You had a knife as you followed him hence the summary assault with a weapon. He was calling out for help as you pursued him, and an off-duty member, Mr James Patrick, answered that call and came upon you rummaging around in the car. He captured what you were doing on footage taken with his phone. There are some stills from that footage in the depositions. He told you to drop the items. You did drop some items but then picked up the knife and assaulted him by walking towards him pointing the knife at him. You demanded that he help you start the car and at one point, you commenced a countdown. 
8	On duty uniform police members arrived on the scene and you absconded into nearby parkland. To round out these very unpleasant events, you then assaulted them in the manner described in the summary before ultimately being subdued. That assault involved brandishing the knife, at one point even having it in your mouth and moving towards them and yelling at them. You were demanding that they shoot you and were refusing to drop the knife. The police were backing away but at least one of the members had a firearm drawn.  Eventually you ran away again, sat down, stabbed the knife in the ground and you were then subdued. 
9	You are quite fortunate the police did not shoot you in the course of this ugly confrontation. 
10	You were arrested and then taken to hospital for treatment for some slight injuries sustained in the arrest. Upon release, the decision was made that you were still affected by alcohol and/or drugs and so the interview was deferred until 4 am the next morning. You made no admissions upon interview. You denied having any knowledge of the events and were in truth a bit belligerent. None of that is in any way a matter of aggravation. You made it plain to the police that your partner had left you and run off with your child and that you had been looking for her everywhere.
11	You were on bail at the time of this serious offending. That was for an October 2018 offence of possession of a controlled weapon, being a knife. That matter is listed before the Magistrates' Court later this week. You had originally been summonsed on that matter, did not appear and a warrant was issued and executed upon you. You were then admitted to bail. Hence you were on bail as of October 2019.  
12	You have been in custody since your arrest on 3 October 2019, a period of 281 days up to but not including the date of the plea.  That period has risen since Friday.
13	You pleaded guilty at a committal case conference on 31 January 2020. 
	Victim impact statement.
14	No victim impact statements have been filed here. I hardly need a victim impact statement to know how frightening this offending was.  Ms McCoy was in her own home when you entered as a trespasser brandishing a knife. It was obviously frightening conduct. Mr Kapevic was driving his car and doing nothing wrong at all and had the misfortune to come across you. Mr Patrick was coming to the aid of a member of the public who was calling for assistance and the police members were discharging their sworn duty when assaulted by you. These are not victimless crimes. I am not able to reach any conclusions as to long term impacts as I don’t have impact statements spelling those things out. However, they are serious crimes which plainly would impact upon the respective victims. I take into account the impact of these crimes.  
	In Mitigation
15	Ms Walker conducted her customarily excellent and thorough plea on your behalf.  A written outline was marked as Exhibit 1.  There was a report from Dr Pandurangi marked as Exhibit 2. Also some assessment and treatment order documents under the Mental Health Act pertaining to your presentation and mindset in August 2019 as well as some documents from Eastern Health which included the details of your treatment on the arrest date. Finally a document from Justice Health relating to your mental state in custody in November and December 2019. I was taken to the sentencing reasons of Judge Punshon from 2011 as well as the facts of an earlier offence committed upon you discussed in the Court of Appeal decision of Best [2015] VSCA 151. 
16	Your counsel took me to your family background. Also to the present position in relation to Ms Brock and your 1 year old daughter, Anne, and your expressed desire to play a meaningful role in their lives. She made submissions as to the intent at the time of entry and to the relative seriousness of the offences and the weight to be given to the various purposes of sentencing. 
17	In mitigation, she relied upon:  
•	Your guilty plea;
•	The stage of that plea;
•	The presence of some remorse;
•	Your disadvantaged background:
•	An increased custodial burden courtesy of the COVID-19 virus;
	Your counsel conceded the inevitability of a sizeable prison term and one requiring the fixing of a non-parole period but suggested that there should be provision made for the possibility of a sizeable period on parole. She described it as a longer than normal parole period but on that score I must say there is no such thing as a ‘normal’ or ‘usual’ non-parole period, or parole period for that matter.   
	Prosecution
18	Ms McGarvie who prosecuted the plea had prepared some amended written sentencing submissions.  They included reference to the case law setting out the manner of assessing the seriousness of the crime of aggravated burglary. There really was nothing controversial in those written submissions and so I see no need to restate them all.  The Director of Public Prosecutions was calling for a term of imprisonment with a non-parole period but of course your own counsel had conceded that was inevitable and she was right to do so. 
19	My attention was taken by Ms Walker to the concession set out in paragraph 2.1 of the prosecution sentencing submissions as to your intent at the time of entry. I could see no basis for that concession to be have been made much less acted on by me and I flagged my concerns with both counsel. I asked the prosecutor as to the evidentiary foundation for that submission and there was none that she could take me to. It seemed to me to fly in the face of the material touching upon your uncontrolled state, not to mention the actual carriage of the knife, the wearing of gloves and your high level of desperation as evidenced by the attempted carjacking, the assault of Mr Patrick and by your desire to be shot shortly after the aggravated burglary. You were, by your own admission, drunk as well as affected by cannabis, ice and Xanax and looking for your partner and child who had left you. Even now, you describe to Ms Walker your recollections of your highly delusional state. You attended the house obviously in the hope of finding your partner and child there. You told Dr Pandurangi that you had the knife to kill yourself.
20	It seemed to me at least, though I was seemingly in a minority of one, that to fix you with some level of control or restraint in such a setting was not entirely realistic and I wondered out aloud in the course of the plea whether I should be a bound by such a concession. Insofar as that concession was being relied upon by your counsel in a mitigatory fashion to make the aggravated burglary somehow less serious, firstly there is nothing minor about entering premises as a trespasser whilst armed with a knife and holding an intent to assault by scaring and intimidating a female within such premises. 
21	Secondly though, as a matter of fairness to you, I felt that I should make it clear to your counsel that I had some serious issues about the mitigatory submission being made and asked her to take me to the evidence supporting the contention. Of course, there was none. 
22	It is plain as day that you entered these premises intending to assault your partner who you believed was in the house. I am satisfied of that beyond reasonable doubt. The same person who months before, you believed was using electronic devices to somehow control you. I had serious reservations as to the concession which was being made and whether I should act on it in all the circumstances. I will come back to this when dealing with the nature and gravity of the offence. 
	Background
23	I will turn now to your background. I will do so quite briefly as I have no reason not to accept what I was told about you by your counsel. The background is mentioned in Dr Pandurangi’s report as well as in Judge Punshon’s sentencing reasons. You were born on 20 January 1989 and are now 31 years old. You were 30 at the time of this offending.
24	You were born in NSW but came to Melbourne at a young age. You have three half siblings. Your father died back in 2013 but your mother is still alive. 
25	It is plain enough from Dr Pandurangi’s report and Judge Punshon’s sentencing remarks that you had a significantly disadvantaged background with parents or step-parents living in a criminal milieu with some of them in and out of prison and with violence, abuse and exposure to drugs and drug taking in your early years. You describe it as gloomy. It is that and much more. You had limited educational opportunities and gravitated yourself into drug use at far too young an age. Hardly that surprising given that background and those unsound influences at work.  Drugs have been seriously problematic with the mention made in the materials of a drug induced psychosis at some points in your life. They and alcohol are directly implicated in the disinhibited state in which you committed these serious crimes. I take into account as far as I am permitted to your disadvantaged early life. I take it into account in mitigation of sentence. It was an unenviable and diabolical upbringing with little by way of consistency, guidance or good example and much exposure to things that no child should have been exposed to. It is hardly surprising that adult life has had some challenges. You have a decent relationship with your three half siblings which is at least one positive. 
26	You have had only a patchy employment record but of course you lost pretty much 7 ½ years of your life owing to the prison term imposed upon you in 2011. I was told that you were not paroled and served out the full head sentence. In fact, that offending had taken place in July 2010 and earlier in that same year you had yourself been the victim of very serious offending as is discussed in the case of Best to which I was referred. You were released at the lapse of sentence in December 2017. You then did a decent amount of work installing stone benchtops with your brother in law. Coming closer to the date of this offending, you had not been travelling well in 2019 and had undergone some inpatient mental health treatment in mid-August 2019. From the two documents placed before me, there was seemingly a sizeable deterioration in your functioning. You had some level of paranoia which is mentioned in some of the materials as likely being another drug induced psychosis. You were discharged in late August and continued to use cannabis, alcohol and other drugs and did not continue taking medication. Dr Pandurangi has no doubt that disinhibition brought about by drug use and alcohol use has a sizeable role to play in your offending. There can be no doubt about that. 
27	The relationship with Ms Brock had spanned over a year but had fallen apart. I was told that the Department of Health and Human Services had come onto the scene in light of the impending birth of your child. They had had in the past some involvement in relation to her other child. Anne was born on 28 June 2019 and as I understand it, you were not to be permitted unsupervised access given concerns about your drug use and were asked to leave the home. No doubt your unpredictability and drug use was not that easy to live with and contributed to the separation. Moving beyond the offence, you are still in a relationship with Ms Brock. There is now a safe contact intervention order which runs until 2022 and you consented to that order earlier this year. You speak to her and your child regularly though of course you are not having any personal visits. She and your mother joined the plea by WebEx and in doing so, demonstrated their support for you. Your partner Ms Brock and one of your sisters, Ms Hatzis, join the WebEx of this sentence today. So you have some support at least.
28	Your criminal history is not overly long especially considering your chaotic upbringing. In fact it is a relatively short history but it is clearly relevant. The appearance in March 2011 is of particular significance.  A 7 ½ year head sentence with a 5 year 3 month non-parole period for a number of serious crimes including aggravated burglary, robbery, false imprisonment and threat to kill. The summary of that offending is set out in Judge Punshon’s sentencing remarks. It was extremely serious offending but of course you were a good deal younger then. The offending had taken place in July 2010 when you were only 21. There is the 2008 NSW District court appearance for armed robbery. Again, though, you were younger still at that point, only a teenager when you robbed a taxi driver. 
29	Let me turn now to consider the other matters in mitigation that have been raised on your behalf in the course of the very thorough plea conducted by Ms Walker.  
	Guilty plea
30	I turn firstly to your plea of guilty.  You have pleaded guilty at what I will treat as the earliest stage.
31	Your victims have all been spared the experience of being called as witnesses.  Being offended against can be very distressing and traumatic. Being cross-examined can itself be a distressing experience.  It can add to the trauma and distress. It has been avoided here for all of the victims, civilian and police alike. I must reward you for your guilty plea.  You have facilitated the course of justice.  
32	You have taken responsibility for your offending. The community has been saved the time, cost and the effort associated with the conduct of a trial up in this court or a committal in the Magistrates' Court.  So, I take these various matters into account in mitigation.
	Remorse
33	Ms Walker suggested you have some remorse. The Crown expressed their reservations on that score.
34	There was no remorse at all on display in the police interview nor in your discussions with Dr Pandurangi. You have pleaded guilty at an early stage. A guilty plea is often but not always indicative of some remorse.  
35	There is no reason for me to think that you are revelling in this offending. Nor though do I see any signs of full remorse. It is hard to know why.
36	You have had some months to think about what you have done but perhaps your disturbed and intoxicated state at the time of the offending makes it difficult to look back and view your conduct in the way that it should be viewed.
37	I will treat the plea as being indicative of some remorse here. I take that into account in your favour. 
38	I turn then to your prospects of rehabilitation.  
	Rehabilitation
39	Your counsel suggested that the Court could only be guarded as to your prospects of rehabilitation given the chronology and the offending. She is right. It is problematic that you are back before the courts for this sort of offending. You have not learnt your lesson from the very sizeable prison term which was imposed upon you for extremely serious past offending. You had youth on your side when you committed the offences which were dealt with by way of prison terms. Well that was then. This offending cannot be put down to immaturity or the excesses of youth.
40	You were no silly teenager out committing foolish or immature offences last October. You were a 30 year old man, a mature adult, albeit obviously one caught up in the emotion of the situation and labouring also under the twin effects of alcohol and drugs. Not that any of that is actually mitigatory. You do not have youth on your side now and have a long history of drug use. You have very few skills but at least enjoy some family support. You wish to play a significant role in the life of your daughter. I hope that you can succeed in that regard. Maybe that desire can trigger some meaningful changes in the way that you live your life for you need to effect great change. You wish to resume your relationship with Ms Brock. Why would she want to have anything to do with you if you are using drugs in the future. She has seen where that leads and so have you. 
41	Judge Punshon no doubt thought his sentence would deter you. It didn’t. My sentence will hopefully serve to deter you to a degree. 
42	Your counsel concedes that I can only be guarded here as to your future prospects of rehabilitation. I am not going to write you off. I am prepared to find that you have some prospects of rehabilitation. That is as high as I can put it. Those prospects are not strong. They will be conditional upon abstaining from illegal drug use and excessive alcohol consumption and complying with medical directions and medication requirements. Drugs have been a serious issue for well over 10 years and are seemingly implicated in serious deteriorations in your mental health and yet you continue to use them. I am not at all optimistic about your future prospects. If you continue to abuse drugs and alcohol you will have very poor prospects of having any meaningful or satisfying life in the future.
	Report of Dr Pandurangi
43	I take into account the report of Dr Pandurangi.  It is not relied upon as enlivening any of the principles from the case of Verdins.  Plainly you had a most unfortunate family and early background. The report sets that out and I have already spoken of the fact that I take it into account as far as I am able to. It is no answer to say “well those events took place all those years ago”. That sort of background and its impact cannot be so easily shrugged off. It has shaped you. It reduces your culpability to some extent. 
44	Equally plainly though, drug and alcohol abuse plays a very sizeable role in disinhibiting you and you know that. I am not treating that as an aggravating factor but it is not mitigatory that you used drugs and committed serious offences whilst disinhibited. I take into account the report of Dr Pandurangi in the ways urged upon me by Ms Walker.
	COVID-19
45	I turn now to the impact of the COVID-19 virus. I accept that the COVID-19 virus and the response to it by those running the prisons will increase your prison burden. It has already. The uncertainties thrown up by the virus and the response to it increases the stress for all prisoners. It is impossible to know precisely how it will impact upon you in the future and that is also part of the stress for you. There are some lockdowns but they do not exist across all prisons so I am not able to conclude that they would apply to you in the future. However you are in half day lockdown for the moment. Visits have already been suspended and so have some courses and programs. I cannot know how long those things may persist. According to a Corrections publication that I mentioned to your counsel, any prisoner who is of good behaviour and who is suffering disruption or deprivation due to the prison response to the COVID-19 virus would automatically be considered for emergency management days. It is not exactly clear what that would mean for you. Presumably the extent of any relief granted will be decided on a case by case basis. It will not be attracted purely by the suspension of personal visits. What lies ahead for you then in prison? It is difficult to forecast the impact of this virus either on those in the community or those in prison. Two or three months ago, things looked bleak. Two or three weeks ago they had looked up with a significant easing of restrictions. Things looked far less promising a week or so ago with spikes in infection and further lockdowns including the first “hard” lockdown. Last week, the greater Metropolitan Melbourne area and one outlying regional area were plunged into a six week lockdown with a resumption of strict stay at home directions. That does not suggest to me that there will be any relaxations in a prison setting anytime soon. I believe then that it is reasonable for me to conclude that there are no prospects in the short term of any in-person visits for any prisoner. That undoubtedly makes prison life tougher for you and has done so since those measures came into force a few months ago. I accept that there is an increased custodial burden in your case for these various reasons.  I take this into account in your favour.
	General remarks
46	I now move to make some general remarks. I have to take into account the nature and the gravity of the offences.  Your counsel concedes the seriousness of the offences and is right to do so.  
47	There have been a number of cases in the Court of Appeal dealing with the manner of assessing the seriousness of the offence of aggravated burglary. The prosecutor referred me to Meyers [2012] 44 VR but could have as easily selected Bowden [2016] VSCA 283. 
48	I see no need to recite slabs from either of those cases. 
49	These were residential premises.  You chose to enter them as a trespasser, and you did so alone, armed with a knife but not in the early hours of the morning.  Plainly enough, you intended to assault and it is clear that you believed your partner was inside. Any way we view it, the intended assault was to be upon a female. I am satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that your intention to assault related to your partner who you believed to be inside the house as well as Ms McCoy, who you knew was there.
50	This was a planned attendance. You were wearing gloves and had the knife. You had been driven to the house. Though there are some features of aggravation lacking, there are ample matters of seriousness here.  You were also, of course, on bail at the time. 
51	I mentioned earlier in these reasons the concession made by the prosecution as to the intention at the time of entry being limited to an assault by instilling fear or by intimidating. As I said earlier, I could see no basis for that submission to have been made and seriously wondered if I should act on it. But for the concession, I simply could not have reached that view, for to reach it, I would need to be satisfied on the balance of probabilities that at the time of entry,  the assault you intended was limited to instilling fear or intimidation by the production of the knife. Your counsel could not point me to any evidence truly supporting that view. Nor could the prosecutor, which made the concession even stranger. Your interview was silent on that score. Your conduct once inside was not decisive as you no doubt hoped your partner would be there and she wasn’t. You do not fall to be sentenced in relation to any assault upon Ms McCoy. 
52	You have virtually no reliable memory of the event and your counsel referred to your instructions as to a recall of your delusional musings as to the desperate need to get to your partner in a hotel or she would be lost to you forever. Having placed your counsel on notice, Ms Walker chose not to call you on the plea on this point, which I am sure was a sensible decision.
53	You were hardly in an optimum state or behaving with good sense or some level of restraint. You were drunk, drugged and emotionally very fragile. You were wearing gloves and had a knife and wanted to get in as you believed your partner who had left you, was inside with your child. You seemingly had nothing to lose as indicated by your later demand that the police shoot you as well as from your account to Dr Pandurangi of your desire to kill yourself on this day. Many of these matters go directly against the finding I am being asked to make and disclose the quite artificial and strange nature of the concession which was made.  It should not have been made.
54	So then why should the concession be acted on by me in a setting where but for the concession, I certainly could not be satisfied on the balance of probabilities that the intended assault was limited to instilling fear and intimidation. I do not pretend that the answer is particularly satisfactory. It is that the Crown who bring the prosecution ask me to act on that concession.  It is not one which should have been made but it has been made and made in the name of the Director of Public Prosecutions of this State and I am uncomfortable not acting on it, as I suppose it is possible that the concession had some role to play in the settlement of this matter. So I will act on that concession as to what was intended by way of assault prior to entry into the premises. Armed with the knife, you intended to enter and to assault by instilling fear and intimidating and harassing a female within.
55	Aggravated burglary is a very serious offence, as countless decisions from our Court of Appeal have spelt out over more than the last decade.  
56	There is always something that motivates illegal entry. Sometimes it is a debt or grievance. Often enough, a relationship breakdown or jealousy. You were entering premises you had no business entering, doing so as a trespasser and with intent to assault. You had a knife. You intended to assault a female partner  who you believed was seeking shelter in that house by using the knife to instil fear and to intimidate her. That is hardly a minor example of the offence. Far from it in fact.
57	Acting as I do on the basis of that concession as to your limited intent to intimidate and scare and not to physically assault, who is to say how this might have all played out had your partner been present when you entered? Aggravated burglary is an inherently dangerous crime.  Things can and do often enough escalate wildly out of control once someone enters premises as a trespasser carrying a weapon. You were in a very disturbed and irrational state of mind. You were significantly disinhibited by drugs and alcohol. It is not too difficult to see the serious risk of escalation in this case. What happens if your partner is present in the house and says “it’s all over and I never want to see you again”. What happens then? What happens if Ms McCoy, who was present, says similar things to you? Things can go very seriously pear shaped when a person trespasses into residential premises carrying a knife, even when there is the limited intention to intimidate and create fear existing at the point of entry. Happily though your partner was not present and the entry did not descend into any physical acts of violence directed at Ms McCoy.
58	This was on any view of it though a serious confrontational aggravated burglary. You were not in a state to be exercising restraint or optimum judgement. Doing all of this whilst on bail. You then committed a most serious offence in the attempted carjacking. A totally innocent motorist was selected. Then you backed that up with the assaults with the knife upon that motorist and then upon the off-duty member who came to his aid. Now in that regard, you were not fixed with any knowledge that he was a police member. He was not in uniform. Outwardly he was just a totally innocent civilian and you assaulted him with a knife. Finally the assaults upon emergency workers being on duty police members.  There is of course a strong need to discourage that sort of assault upon serving members who are going about their duties. 
59	It is not mitigatory that you were affected by drugs or alcohol. It is not mitigatory that you regretted the end of your relationship and were upset. Many aggravated burglaries are committed in the setting of the heightened emotions arising from the breakdown of a relationship or jealousy felt for the onset of a new relationship. Those sorts of things are not mitigatory.
60	Plainly, these are all serious offences as is conceded by your counsel. 
61	As I have said, you have a relevant prior criminal history. Now you don’t fall to be sentenced a second time for any of those past matters. You received and served those past sentences.  However, they to a degree inform me as to your future prospects, the need for weight to be given to specific deterrence and community protection as well as to your risk of re-offence. 
62	Sentencing always involves the balancing of a number of purposes or principles.  I must take into account the maximum penalties as well as the impact of your crimes. I have to take into account your prospects of rehabilitation.  As I have said, I believe I can only be quite guarded here. I find that there are some prospects of rehabilitation but that there is also a significant enough risk of future offending.
63	I must consider the need for specific deterrence. By that I mean the need to deter you from committing crimes in the future.  You have the history before the courts including for aggravated burglary.  You have been imprisoned now on two occasions for serious crimes. You have then committed these serious crimes whilst on bail.  The need for specific deterrence is clear here. I must try again to deter you from offending into the future.  Community protection is also important in this case. Plainly I must protect the community from you. You pose a real risk to innocent members of the community as your conduct here makes so clear.
64	I must also denounce your conduct. It was outrageous conduct. All Ms McCoy had done was to come to your house and obtain some of your partner’s property. You have then behaved in an extreme fashion attending and making the nasty comments before this serious illegal entry. 
65	I must also punish you justly and proportionately. Punishment is an important sentencing purpose
66	General deterrence is also an important consideration here for all the offences. By that I mean the need to deter others.  As I have said, many people who commit aggravated burglaries do so in the setting of the breakdown of a relationship. It is a very common setting indeed and is not in any way mitigatory. Disinhibition brought about by substance use is also common enough. There is a strong need to deter others from committing such serious offences as these, be it the aggravated burglary, or the attempted carjacking or the various assaults. This was a serious smorgasbord of crime. Each offence spilled over into another as you plunged yourself deeper and deeper into serious trouble. 
	Current sentencing practice
67	I pay regard to current sentencing practices.  It is not a controlling factor.  I have looked at the relevant snapshot from the Sentencing Advisory Council being Snapshot No. 237 from April 2020 for the crime of aggravated burglary. The other crimes do not have formal sentencing snapshots. I have looked at the Sentencing Advisory Council online data but again not all of the offences are represented. Carjacking is a relatively recent offence and is not mentioned and nor is attempted carjacking. I have looked at the overviews of sentences in the Judicial College of Victoria Manual dealing with aggravated burglary and carjacking. I have looked at the case of Leishman [2019] VSCA 270 dealing with the completed offence of carjacking. I do not lose sight of the fact that I am dealing with an attempted carjacking with the lesser maximum penalty. Attempted carjacking is still a serious offence. There would be some completed offences with less serious conduct than yours. Though as completed offences, they would have the higher maximum courtesy of the successful taking of a car, the attempt here involved actual physical force being deployed upon this totally innocent and surprised motorist who was wrenched from his car. Some completed offences would involve putting someone in fear of force without actual force being employed.
68	Having mentioned the statistics, I want to make it clear that I recognise that statistical material has inherent limitations. 
69	Statistics do not disclose any of the details of the offence or the offender. They do not even hint at the sorts of things which would explain the particular sentences imposed. Those details are absent from statistics.
70	Nor are other cases precedents.  Every crime is different and so too is every offender.  
71	What I have to do is sentence you for your crimes. 
72	Prison is always a disposition of last resort for any court.  If there is any other option open to the court, then of course it must be selected.  That is, and always has been, the law.  Your counsel correctly concedes that this offending was so serious that it can only be met with sizeable terms of imprisonment with a non-parole period being fixed.  	
	Totality
73	Ms Walker points to the principle of totality. I do pay regard to totality of sentence.  I have looked at the effect of the sentences I will soon pronounce to ensure that it is commensurate with your overall criminality and not crushing upon you. Your culpability was high and is not diminished by the fact that you were upset and disinhibited or badly affected by drugs or alcohol. There is some reduction in culpability derived from your disadvantaged background which I have addressed. 
74	In truth though, in this case, there are not many matters in mitigation. 
75	A large prison sentence is the inescapable consequence of committing a number of serious offences upon a number of different victims even when the offending occurs in a tight time frame. Your conduct leaves the court with no alternative.  I cannot just roll the sentences into each other as though it was just a single crime against a single victim. It wasn’t.  
76	There are here quite separate victims and with serious offences committed upon some of them by you. It was in a very tight time frame. I take that tight episode of offending into account in providing for a level of concurrency.  However, there is still a need for adequate cumulation as between some of the sentences to mark out the separate serious crimes and separate serious impacts upon separate victims. The attempted carjacking for instance was totally separate from the aggravated burglary and targeted a totally innocent motorist. It was a serious crime in its own right and must be the subject of a decent level of cumulation. 
77	You were on bail at the time.  
78	I take care to avoid double punishment when dealing with you on the summary offences of committing an indictable offence on bail given that the indictable offence is one or other of the specified offences on the indictment for which I am actually sentencing you. 
	Disposal Order
79	There is a disposal order that is sought in this case and it is not opposed. I have signed that order. Upon convicting you in relation to the charge of aggravated burglary I satisfied that the provisions of s.78 of the Confiscations Act are satisfied.  I direct pursuant to s.78 of the Confiscations Act the forfeiture to the State of the property referred to in the schedule.  I direct that it be handled and dealt with in the manner contemplated by the signed order.  I am dealing there of course with the disposal of the knife.  I have signed that order.
Sentence
80	I might have you stand up now if you could, Mr Trigg, and I will pass sentence upon you. You will probably not fully understand the effect of the sentences and the order for cumulation which I will pronounce.  I will explain what it all means to you at the end of the process.  Only then will you understand the true nature of this sentence and then I will advise you of the non-parole period.
81	On Charge 1, which is the charge of aggravated burglary, I convict and sentence you to four and a half years' imprisonment.  That will be the base sentence.
82	On Charge 2, attempted carjacking, I convict and sentence you to three and a half years' imprisonment.
83	On Charge 3 and 4 on the indictment being assault of an emergency worker (police) on duty, on each charge, I convict and sentence you to six months' imprisonment.
	Summary Offences
84	On the summary offence of assaulting Mr Kapevic with a weapon, Charge 10, you are convicted and sentenced to five months' imprisonment.
85	 On the summary offence of assaulting Mr Patrick with a weapon, Charge 4, you are convicted and sentenced to five months' imprisonment.
86	On the summary charges of committing an indictable offence on bail, I believe it is open and appropriate to impose an aggregate sentence on those two charges. As I said earlier, I am keenly aware of the need not to doubly punish you for these offences given that the offence committed on bail is either the aggravated burglary or the attempted carjacking. For each of those indictment offences, I have treated it as a feature of aggravation that you were on bail. On those two summary charges (Charges 7 and 8), I convict and sentence you to 14 days' imprisonment by way of an aggregate sentence. 
	Cumulation
87	I direct then that: 
•	15 months of the sentence imposed on Charge 2;
•	Two months of the sentences imposed on each of Charges 3 and 4; and
•	Two months of the sentences imposed on each of summary Charges 4 and 10;
	are to be served cumulatively upon the base sentence and upon each other. 
88	The 14 day aggregate sentence imposed on the two offences of committing an indictable offence on bail will be served concurrently with all other sentences. 

	Total Effective Sentence 
89	These orders result, by my calculation at least, in a total effective sentence of 77 months or six years and five months' imprisonment. 
	Section 16(3C)
90	I make an order under s.16(3C) of the Sentencing Act.  It follows then that I am otherwise directing pursuant to section 16(3C) of the Sentencing Act. 
	Non-Parole Period
91	I am required to fix a non-parole period. I can make no assumptions at all as to whether you will actually be released on parole. That will be for the Adult Parole Board to decide. I must not even speculate about the possibility of release. Your counsel asked for me to fix a non-parole period which would allow you a longer than normal period on parole. I do not accept that there is any such thing but Ms Walker was sensibly arguing that I should not lose sight of your rehabilitation and the possible enhancement and encouragement that may be provided by the structure afforded by release on parole. She was arguing that structure and ongoing support and provision of services upon your eventual release was important. She pointed to the opinion of Dr Pandurangi in that regard. Ms Walker was urging me to at least arm the Adult Parole Board with the ability to consider releasing you on parole for a sizeable enough period. I do not ignore those matters and I will fix a non-parole period which does provide for a decent enough period on parole should you be so released. As I say that will be between you and the Adult Parole Board and has nothing to do with me at all. 
92	I fix a period of 51 months or four years and three months during which you will not be eligible for release on parole.   
	Section 18
93	You have spent 285 days in custody already by way of pre-sentence detention. That period is declared as having been served already under this sentence. 
	Section 6AAA  
94	I have taken into account your guilty plea.  If you had pleaded not guilty and been found guilty of these offences by a jury, I would have convicted and sentenced you to eight and a half years' imprisonment.  I would have fixed a non-parole period in that setting of six and a half years.
95	Just have a seat for a moment, I will see if there are any other matters that I need to deal with. Do each of you understand the individual sentences?
96	MS WALKER:  Yes.
97	HIS HONOUR:  And do the maths add up at least from your perception or not?
98	MS WALKER:  Yes.
99	Ms McGARVIE:  Yes, Your Honour.
100	HIS HONOUR:  Thank you for that.  Thanks each of you for efforts.  You will go down and see Mr Trigg downstairs in custody?
101	MS WALKER:  Yes.
102	HIS HONOUR:  Yes, okay.  Well, Mr Trigg, Ms Walker will come down and see you downstairs and have a chat about the sentence that has just been imposed.  So if you would go with the custodial officer she will see you downstairs soon.  I will sign those orders downstairs.  Given that I have got one member here and one online I will simply leave the Bench at this stage then and then the connection will be disconnected.  Thank you.
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