Jersey Unreported Judgments

Hearing (Criminal) - Inferior Number Sentencing - breach of Community Service Order.

[2018]JRC067

Royal Court

(Samedi)

6 April 2018

The Attorney General

-v-

Jobe Ashley Le Jehan

Paul Anthony Louis

Sentencing by the Inferior Number of the Royal Court on a breach of a Community Service Order imposed on 27^th October, 2017, on the following charges:

Jobe Ashley Le Jehan

Age:  20

Plea: Guilty

Conclusions:

Breach of Community Service Order:-.11 months' imprisonment.

Sentence and Observations of the Court:

180 hours' Community Service Order period to be extended from today. 

Probation Order to be continued. 

Paul Anthony Louis

Age:  51

Plea: Guilty

Conclusions:

Breach of Community Service Order: 6 months' imprisonment.

Sentence and Observations of the Court:

Community Service Order revoked and replaced with 2 years' Probation Order to start from today

R. C. P Pedle; Esq, Crown Advocate for the Attorney General.

Advocate H. B. Mistry for Le Jehan.

Advocate J. W. R. Bell for P. A. Louis.

JUDGMENT

THE BAILIFF:

1.        You are both here because you have breached the Community Service Orders which were imposed by the Court, last October.  

2.        Mr Louis, in your case the court imposed a Community Service Order because you pleaded guilty on the basis that you visited the site on three occasions to help your brother by watering cannabis plants and the court then decided that this passed the custody threshold.  You were given a chance and community service was imposed with a 12 month Probation Order, and the judge then said to you,

"I must point out to you of course as you will be well aware, that if you breach any of those, if you reoffend, or if you do not do what the probation officer tells you in terms of attending meetings and so on, or if you do not turn up for the community service and work conscientiously while you are doing it, then you can be brought back here and in those circumstances it seems highly likely you will go to prison". 

That is what you were told at the time.  

3.        One of the reasons we have been out such a long time is that the court is divided as to what is the right thing to do, today.  One Jurat thought that you should go to prison; you were given that warning.  The other Jurat thought that in the light of the progress which you have made in relation to your drinking, maybe it would be right to give you a chance, and ultimately I have gone with the Jurat who is prepared to give you a chance. 

4.        The reasons for that are several.  You have got a pretty appalling record of offending.  Sometimes things go wrong in life and you get into a spiral of offending and that seems to happen to you every two or three years; it is clear that you have a drink problem.  I do not know if you have considered going to an organisation like Alcoholics Anonymous but you probably should, because you will find that there are people who can help you and if you control the drinking then life can turn around. 

5.        We take the view that on the last occasion the court took a risk in imposing a Community Service Order because it was quite clear that it was not recommended by those who prepare the Social Enquiry Reports; and for that reason we are going to discharge the Community Service Order now and we are going to increase the time during which you must be on Probation, and so the Probation Order is going to be 2 years from now. 

6.        If you breach the Probation Order during that 2 year period you will be brought back here and if you are brought back here then you are liable to be sentenced again for the offence of being concerned in the production of cannabis, and frankly we cannot see any realistic opportunity of you avoiding prison if that happens so this really is a chance for you.  You really do have to take control of your own life sensibly.  We are impressed by the fact that your employer is in court and you have a lot to thank him for and no doubt will want to show that in the commitment to the job which you have.  We hope that will work because the court takes no pleasure seeing you back in court again.  This is a chance so do take it. 

7.        Mr Le Jehan, your offending is rather different.  You were involved with your father's production of cannabis.  You carried out your own production quite independently although it was a smaller amount and you got involved in selling it.  That quality of offending is much more serious and it justifies and, had you been adult, it would have resulted in a custodial sentence without any question. 

8.        When I asked you a moment ago about your employment you gave me a truculent answer and the way in which you deal with people in authority is actually pretty important because if you annoy people in authority they can react badly, you are old enough to know that, you will find your way around that. 

9.        What the law tells us to do today with somebody of your age is that we are not to send you to prison if there is another way, or not to give you youth detention if there is another way, of dealing with you which is appropriate.  And again we have been out such a long time because we have been worrying about that.  You have been given long custodial penalties in the past and you have ignored them, you have not performed and I can tell you now that whatever else you think courts do not anticipate that the orders which they make are going to be ignored and they will not be.  We simply will not stand for it.  I do hope you realise that. 

10.      We are going to continue the Probation Order and the Community Service Order with one variation.  You have done 10 hours only of what you should have done and we think that you ought to be penalised for the way in which you have responded.  So you are going to have to do that 10 hours again.  The Probation Order will continue and you will have to do 180 hours' community service starting from now.  It is broken down in the same way as was the sentence on the last occasion by the different counts.  

11.      The important thing that you have got to take away from this today is that you will not get another such chance because if you blow this one the court is bound to take the view that there is no other way of dealing with you.  We really do not want to but there will not be another alternative.  You are 20, life stretches out ahead of you and it need not be full of convictions, it does not have to be, it can be good.  It is up to you, nobody else is going to take control of your life except you that is you and it is your job. 

12.      In relation to Mr Louis the Community Service Order is discharged and Probation shall be for a period of 2 years running from today.  

13.      In relation to Mr Le Jehan, the 180 hours' Community Service Order and the Probation Order continues and the reason for that is Article 4 of the Criminal Justice (Young Offenders)(Jersey) Law 1994.  

14.      Mr Le Jehan for the avoidance of doubt this is your chance, do take it, we do not expect to see you back in this court again.  The 180 hours' Community Service Order, it must be performed by the 27^th December this year. 

Authorities

Criminal Justice (Young Offenders)(Jersey) Law 1994