Costly trip to see children
A TRIP to the Garden City to visit his children proved expensive for a former Toowoomba man fined for drug driving and other offences dating back five years.
Kerry James Allen Diefenbach spent the night in the watch house after he was arrested for driving with meth in his system on Tomkinson St, Wilsonton, about 11.30am, Wednesday.
Police who arrested him found the 24-year-old was wanted on outstanding warrants.
Those warrants dated back to offences committed at Noosaville in June 2017 when Diefenbach was 19 and did a drive-off from a BP service station without paying $50.15 for fuel he’d pumped into his car, Toowoomba Magistrates Court heard.
Police had picked up Diefenbach early the next morning when responding to a minor crash and arrived to find him changing a damaged tyre at the side of the road.
Checks found he was unlicensed at the time and that the car he was driving was unregistered and uninsured and had number plates belonging to another vehicle, police prosecutor Bettina Trenear told the court.
A police search of the car found 1.3g of cannabis, she said.
Ms Trenear said Diefenbach made admissions to police regarding the offences but hadn’t shown up in court to answer to the charges and warrants for his arrest were issued.
The 24-year-old pleaded guilty to all matters before Toowoomba Magistrates Court on Thursday.
Duty lawyer Julia Molloy, of Skuse Graham Lawyers, told the court her client instructed he was using drugs back in 2017 and was “pretty messed up” at the time.
Ms Molloy said Diefenbach lived and worked in New South Wales and had been in Toowoomba to visit his four children.
“I only saw them for five minutes before the police got me yesterday,” Diefenbach complained from custody, only to be told by Magistrate Kay Ryan to be quiet.
Ms Ryan fined Diefenbach a total $1500, disqualified him from driving for three months and ordered he pay compensation of $50.15 for the stolen fuel in 2017.
Noting Diefenbach was on a suspended sentence from the District Court at the time of the 2017 offences, Ms Ryan recommitted him to the Toowoomba District Court.