KEY POINTS:
A brazen thief who describes prison as "a holiday camp" has been sent back there for almost five years after he ripped off Tauranga schools, aged-care facilities and motels.
Eugene Te Amo, 23, appeared in Tauranga District Court yesterday on a total of 25 charges of burglary committed over a six-month period. He was sentenced to four years and nine months in prison.
The unemployed man's crime spree covered Tauranga, Rotorua, Hamilton, Whakatane and Palmerston North. He stole an estimated $12,000 worth of possessions - all of which he gambled away.
The boldness and premeditation of Te Amo's crimes were yesterday outlined by Crown Prosecutor Elaine Tan.
He had walked into primary school classes at lunchtime to steal from teachers' desks, climbed through the window of a retirement home and stole keys from a Rotorua hospital so he could return later to ransack the reception.
At many burglaries, Te Amo wore a brightly-coloured safety vest so he would look like a workman. If confronted, he would make up an excuse for being there, then leave.
At one point in Palmerston North he pretended he wanted to enrol a child at a childcare centre, speaking to staff for 15 minutes before returning moments later to rifle through their wallets.
Te Amo was arrested in Hamilton on June 11 and later confessed to the burglaries. Fourteen of the burglaries were committed in Tauranga, the worst of which was at Fahy's Motor Inn in Greerton on May 26. Te Amo walked directly into Fahy's and broke into their safe, stealing $5900.
His image was captured on video surveillance and was printed in the Bay of Plenty Times in a bid to catch him.
Following the article, police received a number of calls from people claiming they too had been burgled by the same man.
Between February 12 and May 26, Te Amo had hit six schools, two motor inns, three aged-care facilities, a dance studio, a car at a residential property in Bethlehem and the Cancer Society in 14th Ave.
Defence lawyer Craig Tuck encouraged Judge Louis Bidois to take into account Te Amo's confessions, his early guilty plea and the apology letters he had written to his victims.
He asked for a sentence that would not cause Te Amo to become dependent on prison, as he had previously served two separate sentences totalling more than 4 1/2 years and was only released from a three-year sentence in May last year.
"For a young man, a [lengthy] sentence could be potentially quite crushing ... he is now faced with the prospect of serving yet another sentence," Mr Tuck said.
But in a letter to Judge Bidois from Te Amo, he described his time spent in prison as "like a holiday camp".
Following his release last year he was determined to stay crime-free and found employment. However, once his mother moved to Australia and he was responsible for the care of his brother, Te Amo found himself struggling to cope.
He quit his job and was left without money, resorting to burglaries to fix his finances. But instead he spent the money on his gambling and alcohol addictions.
Judge Bidois urged Te Amo to make the most of the programmes available in prison to work through his issues.
- BOP TIMES
