Children left on road side by car thief
A judge told Jessie Charles Ormandy he was lucky not to face child neglect charges after offloading four young children on the roadside from the car he was stealing.
Ormandy, 24, had been allowed to borrow the car from a woman and she had placed the children in his care in Christchurch on February 19.
Instead, he unloaded the two eight-year-old twins, and children aged six and four, at the end of the street and drove off in the car.
At his Christchurch District Court sentencing, Judge Bernadette Farnan told him it was “concerning activity” and said he could have faced a neglect charge if the police had chosen.
The taking of the car was mean spirited, she said, and he had put vulnerable children at risk.
Ormandy had pleaded guilty to charges including a burglary where he was confronted by the woman resident, unlawfully taking a car, five petrol drive-offs, driving while forbidden, and a breach of prison release conditions.
Defence counsel Tim Fournier said the burglary victim had declined to meet Ormandy at a restorative justice conference but he had written her a letter of apology.
He said the pre-sentence report highlighted Ormandy’s lack of maturity. “He’s a young man who doesn’t act his age.”
Judge Farnan said that soon after Ormandy’s release from prison, he had decided to move from his address in Balclutha and head for Christchurch. “Matters unravelled from that point.”
After the taking of the car in February, five petrol drive-off thefts followed, almost all at Z petrol stations across the city.
Then, Ormandy and an associate were seen on security camera video entering drive-ways.
Ormandy went into one address in Straven Road, knocked on the door and then climbed through an insecure window.
He searched upstairs, and when he was back on the ground floor taking a wallet and iPad he was confronted by the householder who came in from the back yard. Ormandy said he was looking for a fictitious relative and then snatched her handbag.
The woman ended up on the floor in the struggle that followed as he got away. The judge said he was not to face an assault charge as well.
She noted that in his letter of apology, Ormandy said he wanted to take responsibility for his actions and described them as “thoughtless and irresponsible”.
Judge Farnan imposed a series of jail sentences, including one month for each of the petrol thefts, and imposed a term totalling two years one month. She also ordered him to pay $25 reparations to the householder for the loss of some keys.
Category: Focus
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