Serial thief Steven Michael Kells warned by judge, ‘I’m trusting you’

Steven Michael Kells was recently convicted in the Wellington District Court on 18 charges, including for shoplifting Pokemon trading cards. Photo / 123rf

A serial thief who said he stole to make ends meet has been reprimanded by a district court judge.

“There are a lot of people in our community who could feel like that and they’re a lot worse off than you,” Judge Brett Crowley told Steven Michael Kells, adding that for the past seven years, the 34-year-old’s approach had only led him to jail.

Kells recently appeared for sentence in the Wellington District Court on 18 charges including stealing a significant amount of property and illegally using a stolen bank card. There was also possession of methamphetamine and another for assaulting his wife, who he pushed. He told police he did this because he didn’t want her to leave.

The summary of facts showed that earlier this year Kells visited various shops and helped himself to items including Nike shorts, Pokemon trading cards and underwear, along with three large Lego sets.

He was also involved in taking a radar from a locked car and an iPad from another, with a combined value of $2500. The offending was committed at the end of last year and the beginning of this year.

Kells’ history of offending, mostly for dishonesty, runs to 15 pages.

Judge Crowley acknowledged Kells’ terrible history.

“Any judge looking at the sentence I’m about to give you would go, ‘Woah, that was pretty out of line with everything else he got, I’m not going to give him a chance like that again.”

The judge said he was concerned that Kells had told a report writer he stole because he couldn’t make ends meet. But he also said Kells needed to be given a sentence other than prison or home detention.

Judge Crowley told Kells he had a chance to keep doing the same thing and spend the next decade with a blur of going in and out of jail as he’d been doing, or he could do something different. His lawyer, Rufus Hancock, sought a sentence of supervision.

Judge Crowley said that after speaking with Kells’ wife he’d been very impressed by her and her commitment to her husband.

Kells was convicted on the charges and sentenced to 12 months’ intensive supervision, with the judge telling him: ”I’m really trusting you, please don’t let us down, don’t let her down.”

Kells, who has been in custody for more than eight months, left the court in a jubilant mood thanking the judge for his “fair, but stern punishment” and promising to do better.

“You have a lot more positives in your life than some people standing there [in the dock],” Judge Crowley told him. “I wish you well.”

Catherine Hutton is an Open Justice reporter, based in Wellington. She has worked as a journalist for 20 years, including at the Waikato Times and RNZ. Most recently she was working as a media adviser at the Ministry of Justice.