COP-CALLER PEST BACK IN COURT
Mine worker avoids jail
A man with a shocking history of vexatious cop calls when drunk returned to form after 20 drinks at the pub and a bottle of scotch at home, a North Queensland court was told.
Mine worker Paul Anthony Rogers, 49, from Forrest Beach, Hinchinbrook, pleaded guilty in the Ingham Magistrates Court to two counts of improper use of an emergency call service, a federal offence.
Christopher Moore of the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions said the first offence between July 9 and 12, 2023 occurred while he was subject to a good-behaviour bond on the same charge, while the second on September 10 was committed on bail.
Mr Moore outlined Roger’s history of making vexatious complaints to police via the triple-0 emergency number, namely:
• Calling police to allege someone has put a gun to his head in the Irish Club in Mount Isa in 2006, receiving a sentence of 12 months’ probation,
• In 2016, calling QPS to lodge a false complaint that he had been assaulted by an undercover officer in Mackay, receiving a $1000 fine as well as 12 months’ probation for related assault-obstruct police offences,
• A $1000 fine for calling police nine times in three hours in Emerald in July, 2020, • Nineteen vexatious calls in 2021 for which he was jailed for three months, suspended on his own recognisance, and fined $1500.
The CDPP prosecutor said in the latest incident, Rogers made nine calls from July 10-11.
“He told operators that he wanted to be locked up, he made threats against others and he claimed that there were weapons at the premises,” Mr Moore said. He said that police were forced to attend the property twice.
Mr Moore said two months later Rogers made four calls to triple-0 and two to Policelink to falsely allege a person on his property was a pedophile and “making a 12-year-old girl feel uncomfortable”.
He said police arrested Rogers when they arrived and found no girl present, with the defendant recording a bloodalcohol reading of nearly five times the legal limit for driving.
“Offences like this result in the unnecessary use of police resources; he tied up emergency operators and police and could have delayed emergency calls from being received,” he said.
Defence lawyer Darryn Casson of Salt Legal said his client, a fly-in, fly-out driller, was a functioning alcoholic with alcohol abuse a common factor in his offending.
“Alcohol is the issue, so much so that he has up to 20 drinks per night at the pub and then goes home and consumes a bottle of scotch – that’s an incredible amount of alcohol.”
Mr Casson said he had asked his client why he felt the need to call police when drunk.
“Unfortunately, he was so intoxicated that he didn’t know,” he said.
Mr Casson said Rogers was now sober, attending Alcoholics Anonymous in Ingham and was a contributing member of society.
Magistrate Peter Smid sentenced Rogers to concurrent six-month jail terms on each charge, with immediate release on a $3000 good-behaviour bond lasting for three years.
Rogers was placed on 12 months’ probation and ordered to undertake psychological testing and treatment as directed, including continuing with AA. Mr Smid said any further offending would result in time behind bars.