Court hears crims bungled CBD break-in

TWO thieves stumbled upon a treasure trove of neatly packaged bikes when they forced entry to a Railway Street construction site.

But they got greedy. The men called a mate and told him to bring a ute which they filled with about 20 bikes, stolen from the Bikeline Toowoomba Store, a court heard.

They went back a second time, set off an alarm and gave police plenty of evidence linking them to the offence.

NICHOLAS James Collins received a call from two mates late on the night of May 8.

They had just forced their way into a storage room attached to the Bikeline Toowoomba store and had stumbled upon a treasure trove of bikes, most still in their boxes.

There was too many to carry, so the men asked Collins to bring a ute to the rear of the Railway Street building.

Over the course of a few hours, the three men and a teenage girl pilfered about 20 bikes from the store and loaded them into a ute.

The 29-year-old Collins drove it to an undisclosed location, stashed the stolen goods then returned to Bikeline for a second load.

This time the co-offenders tipped an alarm and they fled into the night.

It was for his role as the getaway driver that Collins was brought before the Toowoomba Magistrates Court yesterday to face one charge of entering a premise with intent by break, along with 22 lesser charges, including stealing, fraud and drug possession.

Police Prosecutor Jessica Lynch described the offence as an “organised crime”.

“He has gone there in a borrowed ute, he has gone there in the company of other persons,” she said.

“Metal panels have been removed, tools have been used to remove sections of a wall, access has been gained to the victim’s business.

“The co-offenders were waiting at the back of the business and handed boxes containing bikes to (Collins).”

Sgt Lynch said police recovered the stolen property in the days after the offence and that most had Collins’ fingerprints on them.

The court heard Collins was subject to a six-month suspended jail sentence at the time of the most of the offences that he pleaded guilty to yesterday.

For the defence, solicitor Brad Skuse told the court his client had a rough time serving pre-sentence custody as the prison was subject to Covid lockdown for most of the 93 days that he spent inside. Mr Skuse also took issue with Sgt Lynch’s characterisation of the offence as organised crime.

“It shows a bumbling effect rather than anything planned,” he said.

Magistrates Roger Stark took into account Collins’ sixpage criminal history that was littered with minor offences.

He activated the six-month suspended sentence, added a fresh jail term of nine months, to be served cumulatively and set a parole date of October 1, 2021.