Teen’s ‘drunken prank’
Fire brigade vehicle dumped in peak bushfire season
A TEENAGER committed a “ridiculous drunken prank” when he stole a firefighting brigade’s four-wheel-drive, a court has heard.
Jack David Fraser Sears, 19, of Noonamah, was sentenced to 100 hours of community service and fined $200 in Darwin Local Court on Wednesday after he admitted to trespassing at the Elizabeth Valley volunteer fire brigade and to aggravated unlawful use of the brigade’s speciallyequipped Toyota LandCruiser.
Sears’s lawyer, Matt Hubber, successfully argued his client’s actions in the early hours of August 28 last year were “an example of drunken tomfoolery”. Court records show Sears broke into the fire brigade’s compound, found a bundle of keys and drove off in the $55,000, specially modified LandCruiser.
The 4WD’s dashcam filmed Sears turning on to Redcliffe Rd, Noonamah where he yelled out to a mate, Robert “Robbie” Phillips, who was driving a blue Holden Commodore ute.
Sears then pulled over on Redcliffe Rd and told two other mates, Matthew “Fatty” Fallas and Billy Kaiser “we stole bulk shit cus”.
Sears tore off the 4WD’s dashcam and threw it out the window into nearby scrub off a dirt track, where it was found nearly three weeks later.
The dashcam footage helped lead police to Sears, who by then had dumped the 4WD near a sinkhole at Darwin River, having earlier stashed it in scrub nearer to Redcliffe Rd, where he was staying.
Sears fessed up to police in an interview in September last year, after a raid on the house he had been staying at with mates, during which police found the fire brigade captain’s keys, including those to the 4WD. A further tip-off led police to the 4WD near the Darwin River sink hole.
Prosecutor Bahareh Jaber said the vehicle was missing for more than a month during last year’s peak bushfire season.
Judge Michael Carey said: “I accept that it was a ridiculous, drunken prank on your part and you didn’t realise exactly what you’d done until you sobered up.
“If you come back again for this sort of thing you will definitely go to prison.”