Jail for trashing home of ex, kids

DENNIS Daw had gone through his first breakup – so he smashed his ex-partner’s doors and windows, drowned her TV, dumped her mattress and belongings outside and left notes around the house calling the mother of his children a “dog”.

Daw, a father of two, appeared in Cairns Magistrates Court on Monday and pleaded guilty to aggravated breaking and entering, wilful damage, breaching a domestic violence order and driving while unlicensed.

The court was shown photos of the Cairns unit that Daw, 19, wrecked in a fit of pique – the few furnishings in the modest dwelling had been scattered, broken or covered in debris. The woman lived in the unit with their children.

“The place was literally trashed,” police prosecutor Gary Prior said.

Court documents show Shaw left handwritten notes for the woman, stating “Dee over and out” and “you wanna be a dog, then I’ll be a dog”.

Daw’s extended temper tantrum began on November 6, when he smashed the back window of the aggrieved woman’s car in order to retrieve his bag.

Upon seeing the damage, Daw’s ex-partner said “you could have asked for the vehicle to be unlocked”.

As events would show, Daw was just warming up.

Sometime between the evening of November 24 and November 25, while his expartner was not home, he broke into her unit by smashing through the sliding doors.

“He then smashed and destroyed the oven, several glass windows and the washing machine,” the court documents state. “He also filled the bathtub up with water and threw one of the children’s television sets into it.”

Daw dumped mattresses in the backyard, emptied the refrigerator on the floor and smashed two more televisions on the street. The woman’s personal belongings had been strewn on the floor or tossed into the trash.

At 7.30 o’clock that evening, in case the notes were not clear, Daw called her and told her that he was the culprit.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Legal Service lawyer Natasha Jackson told the court the relationship had ended with Daw’s first breakup.

“He handled it terribly,” Ms Jackson said. She said her client had suffered from an anger management problem and had offered to pay restitution for the damage.

Magistrate Allan Comans said Daw’s actions were designed to harass and intimidate. “The photos depict significant damage,” Mr Comans said.

He jailed Daw for 12 months to be paroled immediately, fined him $400 and disqualified him from driving for two years.