Graffiti vandal gets placed under house arrest

A 23-year-old man who caused $17,000 in graffiti damage to more than a dozen buildings throughout St. Catharines was warned to quell his artistic urgings in order to avoid a jail term.

“You listen to me carefully,” Judge Harvey Brownstone told Jermaine Griffith. “Don’t you dare deface anyone else’s property ever again because if you do, sir, I’m going to put you in a place where you just might find yourself getting defaced … if you catch my drift. Get it? Got it? Good.”

Griffith appeared in Ontario Court of Justice in St. Catharines via Zoom on Monday and pleaded guilty to three charges of mischief.

The St. Catharines resident was granted a three-month conditional sentence, also known as house arrest, and placed on probation for three years.

Between October 2018 and January ’20, court heard, Griffith spray-painted the tag “SLUB” on more than a dozen properties in St. Catharines.

“It wasn’t just foolish … it was incredibly, incredibly irresponsible,” the judge told the defendant.

Griffith was also banned from having anything in his possession that could be used to “make graffiti.”

“Why don’t you use the next three months, while you’re under house arrest, to do something artistic that people might actually appreciate,” the judge said. “I suggest you get yourself a website and do your art online so we can all look at it and make yourself famous that way, without committing any crimes.”

Niagara Regional Police made several graffiti-related arrests in January 2020 in response to a proliferation of tagging found across St. Catharines.

Also arrested was Travis Coutu, who caused in excess of $100,000 in damage.

He appeared in court earlier this month and pleaded guilty to a dozen counts of mischief in connection with a series of more than 100 tagging incidents. In that case, the tag “HUER” was spray-painted on postal and electrical boxes, utility poles, fences, buildings and vehicles in St. Catharines and Niagara Falls.

The judge in that case imposed a two-year conditional sentence, followed by probation for three years.