Driver on ‘treadmill’ of offending

A man sentenced on his fifth charge of driving while disqualified has been stuck on a treadmill of reoffending, his lawyer told the New Plymouth District Court.

Brook Steven Tarasiawicz, 24, was first disqualified from driving eight years ago, when he was caught doing burnouts.

Earlier this year he was caught driving while disqualified for a fifth time while he was heading to his former partner’s house, just two weeks before his latest disqualification was due to finish.

‘‘He has been on a disqualification treadmill since 2009,’’ defence lawyer Paul Keegan told judge Chris Sygrove this week.

Tarasiawicz had also earlier pleaded guilty to attempting to pervert the course of justice after he was given a sentencing indication by Sygrove on August 24.

Keegan asked Sygrove to consider a more rehabilitative sentence to allow Tarasiawicz to try and break the cycle.

Crown prosecutor Georgia Milne said she didn’t think Tarasiawicz qualified for a reduced sentence just because he kept committing the same offence over and over.

Sygrove said he had given a sentencing indication of six months’ home detention, but had been open to a more rehabilitative sentence if the pre-sentence report found it was suitable.

He said after reading the report and looking over the results of the restorative justice meeting with the victim, he had decided he would give Tarasiawicz a chance to turn his life around.

On both charges, he sentenced Tarasiawicz to four months of community detention with a curfew between 8pm and 6am, as well as 10 months`’ supervision with special conditions.

He accepted Keegan’s application to have the mandatory period of disqualification from driving reduced from 12 months to six months and sentenced him to 80 hours community work to make up for the other six months.

Report by David Burroughs