COURTS BERATE ‘INSANITY’

A RISE in the number of knife-related crimes going through the Southport Magistrates Court has magistrates and criminal defence lawyers worried that more people could be killed.

Magistrates have been repeatedly reprimanding and lecturing people for carrying a knife, warning that the practice could be deadly.

Twice already this year, magistrates in Southport Magistrates Court have lectured knife-wielding offenders.

On Friday, magistrate Michelle Dooley told one man being sentenced for multiple charges, including possessing a knife: “You must not under any circumstances carry a knife.”

A day earlier, magistrate Kerry Magee told a teenager accused of carrying a knife that it was “always bad to be carrying a knife”.

“It is extremely disturbing that young people go around arming themselves with knives,” she said.

Last month, magistrate Kathleen Payne gave Lachlan Jason SelwoodDebelak a 10-minute lecture when he was sentenced for pulling a knife during a fight.

She described the acts as “insanity and foolishness”.

“You are very lucky you are not charged with murder because there are a lot of young men 19 years old in jail waiting for a murder trial because of exactly the same circumstance that you found yourself in,” she told him.

Selwood-Debelak pleaded guilty to assault occasioning bodily harm whilst armed and in company.

Ms Payne sentenced Selwood-Debelak to 18 months’ probation and ordered him to complete 40 hours of community service.

He must also pay the victim $2000 in compensation.

No conviction was recorded. In November last year, defence lawyer Jason Jacobson, of Jacobson Mahony Lawyers, gave his own client, Jac Michael Webb, a scolding during the court case.

“The message needs to get out there and let people like my client know that terrible things can happen and much worse injuries can happen,” he said.

Mr Jacobson said the “courts are sick and tired of young people walking around with knives”.

Webb, 18, pleaded guilty to assault occasioning bodily harm while armed. He was sentenced to six months in prison with immediate parole.