Dunedin District Court
AN intoxicated man who burgled two houses when walking home after consuming alcohol throughout the day was sentenced to 18 months’ jail when he appeared before Judge Philip Connell in the Dunedin District Court yesterday.
David Robert MacPherson (54), of Dunedin, had 13 previous convictions for burglary. Presentence material indicated he did not want to undertake any form of rehabilitation, the judge noted.
‘‘You have had rehabilitation before. It hasn’t worked. I’m sending you to prison,’’ the judge told him.
MacPherson had been convicted of committing the burglaries, and unlawfully being in the enclosed yard of another property, on May 23.
The police summary said MacPherson was walking home, intoxicated and wanting more alcohol and food, about 10.30pm.
About 10.40pm he went to a house where two adults were playing video games in the lounge while their children were asleep in bed.
Entering the house through the unlocked front door, MacPherson walked into one child’s bedroom before continuing up the hallway.
He looked into a bedroom at the end of the hallway and left.
The victims’ son alerted the adults about what had happened.
Soon after, MacPherson returned to the house and opened the front door.
Met by the male parent, he apologised to him and walked off down the street muttering to himself.
At a house further along the road, MacPherson tried a door handle, rattling it. But the door was locked.
A male inside woke and went to the door but did not see MacPherson.
At a third address, MacPherson opened the back door and went inside.
The occupant, an older woman living alone, was asleep.
MacPherson took a ‘‘throw’’ from the sofa and began filling it with food items from the fridge and freezer.
Woken by banging and crashing coming from inside her house, the woman observed MacPherson through a gap in her door.
She watched him walking down the hallway with the ‘‘throw’’ over his shoulder.
Terrified, she hid out of view from him in her bedroom.
Approaching her bedroom, MacPherson stopped in the doorway.
The two saw each other.
The woman screamed. MacPherson turned around and left.
He ran off saying it wasn’t him.
As he ran around the back of the property he dropped the ‘‘throw’’ and the items he had taken and climbed the fence on to South Rd where he was stopped by police.
In explanation, he said he was looking for some more alcohol and food.
Counsel Marie TaylorCyphers said MacPherson had been in custody since June 15 and had learned a salutary lesson.
MacPherson was sentenced to 18 months’ jail for the burglary of the woman’s house, 14 months for the other burglary and four months for being unlawfully in an enclosed yard — all terms concurrent.
Other convictions
Conall Michael Davidson (26), employed, of Dunedin, drinkdriving, 1186mcg, and careless driving (making right turn from Walton St into School Rd veered on to wrong side of road, crashed into parked car), about 2.40pm, April 13, 200 hours’ community work, 12 months’ supervision, disqualified indefinitely (zero alcohol provisions when regains licence), not to have interest in any vehicle for 12 months. Counsel Steve Turner said stresses in Davidson’s life at the time, balancing study and fulltime work, ‘‘makes no bones about having messed up badly and it being unacceptable . . . has paid for the $7288 damage caused’’. Judge acknowledged Davidson remorseful; noted he had one previous drinkdrive conviction.
A Shannon Owen Taylor (26), of Dunedin, driving while driver’s licence suspended, and careless driving (in Andersons Bay Rd, approaching intersection with Hillside Rd failed to notice traffic in his lane had stopped for red light at Strathallan St; his attention drawn to side of road, when looked back in front of him, realised vehicles had stopped, braked heavily but hit vehicle immediately in front of his, that vehicle then shunted into second vehicle; occupants of victims’ vehicles shaken but not injured), about 4pm, March 25, overall sentence nine months’ supervision, disqualified eight months, reparation $1500 ($100 a week for 15 weeks).