Former Shire employee gaoled
This morning, in the District Court in Perth, Judge Gillian Braddock
sentenced former Shire of York depot worker Christian Tarou Chadwick to three-and-a-half years imprisonment for aggravated
burglary.
He also received an additional 18 months for assault.
For pleading guilty—eventually—and saving the State the trouble and
expense of a trial, Christian’s penalty was discounted by 15%.
The sentences will be served concurrently, with a non-parole period of
21 months.
In case readers have forgotten, Christian, while employed by the Shire,
was allegedly responsible for a campaign of bullying that resulted in the
departure of two of his colleagues and ensuing compensation payouts amounting
to about $100,000.
Protected as he was by his friendship with a former deputy CEO, he had
no difficulty in hanging on to his own job for several years—until the current
administration, having dispensed with her services, succeeded last year in
dispensing with his.
See my article The Untouchables
posted 23 November 2015 (http://shireofyork6302realvoice.blogspot.com.au/2015/11/the-untouchables.html).
Mitigation
The judge expressed surprise that Christian had spent no time in
custody since being charged more than two years ago with invading a private
dwelling where a children’s birthday party was in progress and breaking the
male householder’s collarbone with an axe handle.
(No doubt her surprise was compounded by the knowledge that Christian faces
a further charge of breaching the conditions of his bail. He is scheduled to appear on that
charge in Northam Magistrate’s Court next Monday, 26 June.)
Predictably, his lawyer pleaded in mitigation that Christian had had a
terrible childhood, never knew his biological father, has drug and alcohol
‘issues’ and on release faces the threat of immediate deportation to his native
New Zealand.
That plea reflects the postmodern moral imperative that perpetrators of
violence and other habitual contributors to the sum of human misery, far from
being depraved or deranged monsters flouting society’s rules, are in fact helpless
victims of circumstances and inner compulsions beyond their control.
This supposedly gives them an irrefutable claim to our compassion and concern—a
greater claim, we are sometimes prompted to believe, than that of the folk they
subject to terror, humiliation and assault.
Judge Braddock pointed out that the question of deportation was one for
the Department of Immigration, not the court.
‘Mandz’
Christian’s partner, Amanda ‘Mandz’ Macnamara, was in court to witness
his fate.
Mandz is mother to his five children and a Facebook friend of Cr Trevor
Randell (see Notes from Underground
posted 25 May 2016 at http://shireofyork6302realvoice.blogspot.com.au/2016/05/notes-from-underground.html).
Like Christian, Mandz no longer dwells in York. A while ago, she moved with the
children to her mother’s home in Pinjarra.
Mandz has a well-deserved reputation for making her presence felt
wherever she goes.
She lived up to that reputation in court today by screaming at the
mother of Christian’s victim the immortal words ‘Are you proud of what you’ve
done to my family?’
Court security restrained her before she could take matters further and
the grandmother she screamed at left the court precinct unharmed.
Mandz has her own problems with the law. Not very long ago, while she was still living in York, the
police found illicit drugs in her car and at her home and charged her with
possession.
About time for all of them. Yoo Hoo Good riddance!!
ReplyDeleteFinally, justice for the York family he traumatised, they were brave people to see this through.
ReplyDeleteCongratulations to the York Police for a great result. This thugs behaviour was disgusting and the sooner he is deported the better.
I do wonder at Mr Chadwicks' lawyer, using the excuse that he 'might' be transported back to New Zealand. What is his problem? That is where he came from isn't it? He must have family and possibly even friend(s) over the ditch. One would have thought that he would be happy to go back home and I assume that there is nothing to stop his partner and children joining him.
ReplyDeleteThe only thing I could think of right now, is that the minute he steps back onto native soil
the Kiwi cops will be there, ready to scoop him up and shove him back behind bars, for a further extended period - where he belongs.
Parole after 21 months? Really? After everything he has done to some number of folk in York and possibly elsewhere, not nearly enough.
Can only assume that it is because we have a minimum of places behind bars in W.A. and a greater number of such facilities over in N.Z. Very Good Luck to Him - in N.Z!
While I'm as happy to see him locked up as the next person, it is right that his lawyer brought up the threat of deportation. He must have family there? Not necessarily. If there are barriers to his partner and children joining him (for eg see the last para of the article), then that leaves young children without a father. That punishment suggests permanently losing access to his children is an appropriate penalty for his actions - but only because he is not Australian. Imagine the courts banning the kids of an Australian multiple rapist/murderer from visiting their dad in jail. The deportation laws are a blight on our 'fair' nation, and their use to boot minor-league petty thugs out of the country really shouldn't be lauded.
DeleteAlso, 'H'im???
The people he has assaulted probably think him more than a minor league petty thug.
DeleteThank you for your interesting and provocative comment, Anonymous 26/6/17 at 20:21. I don’t agree with you, and here’s why:
Delete1. Self-evidently, the first business of any sane government and legal system is to protect the majority of citizens, who are mainly peaceable and law abiding, from people who have done them harm and may harm them again. In this age of identity politics and pandering to the special treatment demands of noisy and sometimes scary minorities, that requirement is something our society and civilization appear to be losing sight of.
2. Chadwick’s lawyer was indeed right to bring up the ‘threat’ of deportation. It was his job to do that, in the hope of reducing his client’s sentence. Equally, the judge was doing her job when she gave that aspect of the plea in mitigation short shrift.
3. Chadwick could have avoided the threat of deportation as well as the fact of imprisonment by behaving like a normal human being instead of as a malevolent bully and (not so petty) thug. The crimes for which he is now serving time were not his first and only offences. He was convicted and imprisoned in 2009 for throwing a multanova operator into a busy highway – an action the judge on that occasion described as ‘spectacularly dangerous’. I’d say Chadwick’s claim on our sympathy and compassion is remarkably thin.
4. In any case, it is Chadwick himself who must bear full responsibility for his plight and for that of his children. Nobody forced him to commit his crimes. His partner, for her part, seems to be one of those people who believe that others are always to blame for their misfortunes – witness her priceless verbal attack on his victim’s mother. And she will also be to blame if, having been convicted here of drug offences that nobody forced her to commit, New Zealand refuses to let her in. When Chadwick’s children visit him on his native turf, as I hope they will, Mandz may have to stay at home.
5. The deportation laws are by no means a ‘blight’ on our nation. It is commonsense that we should banish by legal process as many foreign malefactors as we reasonably can. Australia is in every sense one of the fairest nations on earth. It will remain so only for so long as the welfare of the majority of citizens takes precedence over the claims of villains, especially those from other places and climes.
How did the breach of bail case go?
DeleteI don't know how it went. It may not have happened at all. My trophy lawyer informs me that the matter may have been settled by the district court judge on the basis of what is known as a section 32 certificate. If so, CTC wouldn't have had to appear in the magistrate's court because the breach of bail penalty was included in the judge's sentencing decision. If he did appear, he would have done so via videolink from prison.
DeleteHis was physical bullying, Yours sir is by the pen. To that end it is the same thing.
DeleteI trust that this time you have actually mangaed to get all the facts or have you gone off half cocked again in your biased views? No doubt your communistic views will prevent you from posting this too?
Sir, I am finding it difficult to decide whether you are a nitwit, a numbskull or a nutter - or perhaps all three.
DeleteMy 'views' are not 'communistic', and I have written nothing that would indicate that they are.
Chadwick wasn't at all the only depot employee responsible for the compensation payments through bullying.
ReplyDeleteYes, I know. In my article 'The Untouchables', referred to above, I wrote that 'Mr Chadwick was not only a bully himself, he also inspired others to do a bit of bullying on their own account or to act as his accomplices'.
DeleteMy sources for that article made it clear that Chadwick was the ringleader but by no means the only culprit. However, the source was reticent about naming the others involved.
We shouldn't forget that senior staff of the day, if not themselves directly complicit in the bullying, tolerated it and appear to have taken pains to cover it up. In my view, that makes them hardly less culpable than Chadwick himself.
It's a pity that nobody in authority bothered to question the former DCEO and HRO about their reasons for protecting Chadwick - indeed, for giving him, a convicted violent offender, a job for which he lacked the required driving licence and which had been earmarked for another worker who then had to leave his job.
When I wrote 'The Untouchables' in November 2015, I did so under the impression that Chadwick had ceased working for the Shire. I was surprised to learn, not long afterwards, that he was still on the payroll.
It must have been something more than simply friendship that kept him in the job. I've heard along the street that the police may have more than a passing interest in the matter, but I wouldn't want to speculate as to why.
Finally some justice for at least one family in York. With any luck those who protected, encouraged and did his dirty work for him will finish up joining him behind bars.
ReplyDeleteIt will be a great day for Australia when he is deported.
Confirms the DCEO and HRC were not fit for their jobs. Will they visit him and take him treats?
ReplyDeleteWill they be home made treats?
ReplyDeleteDo you mean 'home-brewed'?
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Thanks for your appreciation and encouragement.
DeleteGood riddance. He got away with using our legal system for too long. The sooner he is sent back to NZ the better for everyone.
ReplyDeleteThe York Police will be pleased to see the back of him.
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Eh?
Delete