The man burgled the Christchurch house after smashing his way in through a kitchen window. Photo / 123RF
Edward Charles Davis is now so shaped by a life of crime he has become “desensitised” to it.
The 37-year-old is now heading back behind bars after smashing his way into a Christchurch home and helping himself to jewellery and electronic items.
Davis, bearing a distinctive facial tattoo and closely cropped hair, appeared for sentencing today in the Nelson District Court via video link.
He was often seen hanging his head as snippets of his difficult life were mentioned.
Judge Lawrence Hinton said in sentencing him to 15 months in prison on the lead charge of burglary that while Davis had indicated remorse his regret in this instance “may be aligned with apprehension”.
It was mid-afternoon on June 13 this year when he burgled the Riccarton property when no one was home.
He smashed a hole in a kitchen window and then the bathroom window and climbed into the house before ransacking it and stealing $4533 worth of jewellery and electronic items. He caused more than $2000 worth of damage to the house while breaking in.
Just hours earlier he had opened the rear door of a car parked in the driveway of another Riccarton property and stole two debit cards.
Davis then went into a nearby dairy and used the card three times to buy goods.
On the night of June 20, Davis was in Picton when he found a BNZ debit card and used it to buy tobacco worth $133 on PayWave.
He used the card again on three occasions at a Picton superette to buy Prezzy cards worth a total of $332.
Davis then moved on to another Picton store and used the card unlawfully to buy more Prezzy cards worth $467.85 in total, over three separate PayWave transactions.
Judge Hinton sentenced Davis on a total of 13 charges to which he had earlier admitted, including burglary, theft from a car, and nine charges of obtaining by deception which occurred each time he used the bank card.
He noted that Davis had been shaped by a life of crime and now felt institutionalised through having spent a significant part of it in custody and was now “desensitised” to it.
Judge Hinton said Davis had grown up amid violence, drugs and crime which had pre-disposed him to a life centred on drug use.
He said aggravating factors included the burglary was committed at a residential home from where high- value items were stolen.
Davis incurred an uplift to his sentence because he had breached conditions of release from custody when he offended by using the bank cards.
From a starting point of two and a half years in prison, Davis was given a 25% credit for his guilty pleas and a further 15% for personal factors contained in a confidential report, to arrive at an 18-month prison term.
The end sentence was 15 months in prison on the lead burglary charge. Davis was convicted and discharged on the charges of theft and breaching his release conditions.
He was also ordered to pay reparation of just over $2000 for losses incurred by the holder of one of the bank cards, plus losses incurred by the bank in transaction fees.
Tracy Neal is a Nelson-based Open Justice reporter at NZME. She was previously RNZ’s regional reporter in Nelson-Marlborough and has covered general news, including court and local government for the Nelson Mail.
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