Man cut bracelet off ‘to get space’

It was his grandmother’s plea that kept Samuel Lewis Pepperell-Carr out prison, but six months later, that’s where Taranaki man has ended up after he cut off his electronic monitoring bracelet and fled to his girlfriend’s house.

Pepperell-Carr, 21, had been sentenced to nine months’ home detention after he attacked Stratford sushi shop owner Kristen Shin and attempted to take her car on December 6.

As she screamed and fought his attempts to steal her keys, Pepperell-Car bit her twice before he ran off, pursued by garage owner Peter Martin, who chased him down a lane, over fences and into an alleyway, despite Pepperell-Carr making threats to knife him and kill his family.

In May, Pepperell-Carr was sentenced on charges of injuring with intent to injure, common assault, wilful damage, resisting police, two counts of threatening to kill, attempted unlawful taking of a motor vehicle and assaulting police.

Although a pre-sentence report recommended jail, lawyer Paul Keegan had urged Judge Chris Sygrove to consider a sentence of home detention and Pepperell-Carr’s grandmother wrote a letter offering to oversee a home detention sentence at her Waitara home.

Pepperell-Carr, who had his

21st birthday while he was on remand, told Sygrove he had spent a lot of time thinking about his future. ‘‘I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in prison, I want to change my ways,’’ he said at the time.

Sygrove warned Pepperell-Carr he had been considering prison before he decided on home detention. ‘‘Were it not for your grandmother’s letter you’d be going to jail. Don’t let your your grandmother down.’’

But that’s exactly what Pepperell-Carr did on September

12 when he cut off his electronic monitoring bracelet and fled to his girlfriend’s house.

He was arrested there without issue the following day.

On Thursday, Pepperell-Carr appeared in the New Plymouth District Court for the escape, which defence lawyer Paul Keegan said was doomed from the start.

Pepperell-Carr had been feeling cramped and felt he needed space, Keegan told the court.

Judge Kevin Glubb said Pepperell-Carr’s escape had been impulsive, like most of his previous offending. ‘‘Why you didn’t abide by those conditions is hard to see but you have got yourself in a pickle,’’ he said.

He sentenced Pepperell-Carr to three months in prison for the breach of home detention and converted the remainder of his home detention sentenced to an additional 11 months in prison.

"I don't want to spend the rest of my life in prison." Pepperell-Carr