Shoplifting — it’s all in the family
The matriarch of a family shoplifting syndicate has been sent to prison after racking up more than 100 convictions.
From homewares to bank cards, and trolleys full of food, Rawinia Andrews stole it all. And then she got caught.
Andrews, 40, was sentenced at the Hamilton District Court on Monday after earlier pleading guilty to 13 dishonesty offences and one charge of assault. She now has about 102 convictions under her belt – almost half of those are for shoplifting.
The defendant is a recidivist offender for dishonesty and offending, the police summary of facts read. ‘‘She offends with other members of her family and is a major influence in getting them to commit crime with her.’’
Andrew’s latest crime spree saw her pocket bottles of fragrances while at the Farmers department store with two of her grandchildren. At Pak’N Save on Mill St, she filled a trolley with groceries and strolled out the front door. She tried the same at Countdown on Peachgrove Rd but was confronted by staff and took off. A second theft at Countdown saw Andrews charged with burglary as she had been trespassed from all their supermarkets.
She also hit a worker in the face with a bag and was charged with assault. And in a brazen act earlier this year, she walked out of a store with two electronic items and pretended they were hers. In February, Andrews and a co-offender entered Cash Converters on Barton St.
She took a stereo off the shelf, valued at $149, approached staff and told them the item was hers and she wanted to sell it. She then gave the stereo to her co-offender who put it in the boot of her car. Andrews returned to the store and did the same with a computer monitor, valued at $25.
In July this year, Andrews and a co-offender, another member of her family, stole almost $1900 worth of rugs and a mat at Briscoes at The Base.
The co-offender wheeled
the trolley near the exit. As the staff were distracted, the defendant signalled her co-offender to wheel the trolley out of the store.
Some of the offending was captured on camera, and on one occasion when questioned by police, Andrews said ‘‘she has no comments but admits she has done a few lately’’, the summary read.
She was also charged with breaching the conditions of her intensive supervision order, an order that was imposed earlier this year. In his summing up, Judge Noel Cocurullo said Andrews had a disgraceful history of offending.
Andrews’ lawyer, Russell Nye-Wood, said some of the crime his client committed was opportunistic.
He also said she was willing to engage in restorative justice, though that had not taken place yet.
Nye-Wood proposed an end sentence of 24 months, which he said would hold his client accountable.
‘‘It does reflect overall that a lot of this offending has happened while on bail.’’
He proposed a sentence of home detention as his client’s 20-year-old daughter was experiencing a difficult pregnancy and Andrews was eager to support her children.
But police opposed home detention because they believed Andrews’ would still be able to influence her family, even from the confines of her home.
‘‘The daughter that is talked about, I have just looked her up ... she was convicted last month of shoplifting,’’ police said in court.
Judge Cocurullo sentenced Andrews to 24 months’ imprisonment. She was also ordered to pay reparation for some of the goods she had stolen, a total of $1882.