Jersey Unreported Judgments

Inferior Number Sentencing - maliciously setting fire to property of another.

[2015]JRC161

Royal Court

(Samedi)

31 July 2015

The Attorney General

-v-

Rodrigo Jose Barros Goncalves

Sentencing by the Inferior Number of the Royal Court, following a guilty plea to the following charge:

Age:  31.

Plea: Guilty.

Details of Offence:

While refuelling a car the defendant started a terrifying fire by holding his cigarette lighter to the flowing nozzle of the petrol pump.  Staff pressed an isolator switch and there was little prospect of the underground fuel tanks catching fire, but the fire might still have engulfed a car.  Unable to explain actions, save that he was drunk.

Details of Mitigation:

Attempted to put the fire out.  Shocked and remorseful.  Good father and employee. 

Previous Convictions:

22 convictions of all kinds.  Incarcerated for violence (2001) and drugs trafficking (2005).

Conclusions:

Compensation Order sought in the sum of £60 or 7 days' imprisonment, consecutive, in default.

Recommendation for deportation sought.

Sentence and Observations of Court:

The Court had to balance the danger and fright caused to the public with the short-lived and idiotic nature of the act itself. 

Compensation Order made in the sum of £60 to be paid within 10 days or 7 days' imprisonment, consecutive, in default of payment.

No recommendation for deportation made.

D. J. Hopwood, Esq., Crown Advocate.

Advocate S. C. Thomas for the Defendant.

JUDGMENT

THE BAILIFF:

1.        You are here to be sentenced on one count of maliciously setting fire to the property of another, contrary to the Fire and Rescue Service (Jersey) Law 2011.  The photographs which are in the bundle, and which you will have seen as well, tell their own story.  Arson is a very serious offence and that is why the legislature has provided for a maximum sentence of 10 years' imprisonment for the offence.  The Court has struggled, looking at what happened on this occasion, with what your motivation can possibly have been.  Anybody, rationally, would know that lighting and setting fire to a petrol pump is capable of causing a huge amount of damage and you could not have known that actually the system would close down straightaway, and you were not going to set the garage on fire but we cannot understand what you were thinking about and by your shaking of your head it appears that you do not know either. 

2.        It seems to us that this was probably a few seconds, and looking at the timing on the photographs the whole incident did not take more than 10 or 15 seconds, a few seconds of some very serious stupidity.  The fire was brought under control, as I say you did not know it was going to be possible but it was, but we did note that you yourself took immediate steps to help bring it under control as well.  You immediately tried to put it out and it is a question really of balancing that serious stupidity on the one hand and the potential consequences because passers-by would have been terrified, we think probably you must have been terrified, and there could have been serious damage to the car or to the garage itself or to other cars nearby. 

3.        Your record is not something you should be proud of.  We have had to look at that record in the context of the Crown conclusion that we should make a recommendation for deportation and you should know we have had a serious discussion about that.  Living in this island for foreign nationals has been said by the Court on many occasions a privilege; you cannot just make the assumption that you are entitled to stay here and that is why the law does provide for recommendations for deportation when people's conduct falls short of what is acceptable to us as a community in Jersey. 

4.        We have had regard to your guilty plea and your expressions of remorse and to everything your counsel has very fairly and fluently said on your behalf.  We think that this case passes the custody threshold and that we should impose a prison sentence on you. 

5.        We think that, for the various reasons I have given, the Crown's conclusions are too high and we are going to sentence you to 18 months' imprisonment.  During that time you will have the opportunity, because of the way in which the prison is structured these days and provides other courses available to you, you will have the ability to use that time productively and you should, in your time in prison, give serious thought to your drinking, which clearly is a problem.  So you can use the prison sentence constructively and we hope that you will. 

6.        We are not going to make an order recommending your deportation but you must realise that if you were to commit further offences a different court might take a different view of that subject.  We accept your son is important to you and you need to keep that in the front of your mind because if you continue on this course there will just be more trouble ahead.  

7.        We also make the Compensation Order which the Crown has concluded in the sum of £60 in favour of the garage for refilling the fire extinguisher and producing the CCTV footage.  You have ten days to pay, we are told you can pay immediately so we give you ten days to pay and there is a default sentence of 7 days' imprisonment consecutive if you do not pay it. 

Authorities

Fire and Rescue Service (Jersey) Law 2011.

AG v Pallett [2006] JRC 138.

AG v Rawlinson and Oeillet 1998/176.

AG v Haslam 2001/122.

AG v Perreira and Thomas [2012] JRC 216A.

AG v Fortun 2002/205.

Rojek v AG [2014] JRC 017.