A member of Melbourne's Chaouk crime clan feared for his life and started crying after accidentally shooting himself in the testicle when reaching for cigarettes in his pocket, a court has heard.
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Omar Chaouk shot himself in the groin and right testicle outside the Caroline Springs home of an associate in the early hours of March 17 last year, the County Court heard on Tuesday.
Prosecutor Catherine Parkes told a plea hearing that after shooting himself with the .22 handgun, Chaouk asked the woman "if he was going to die, and started crying", before the woman and another man drove him to Sunshine Hospital.
Chaouk later asked the woman to tell police he had been playing with a pen gun.
He was arrested the following day, and charged with being in possession of a gun while a prohibited person. He was also charged with the theft of two cars and a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, which he stole after asking the respective owners if he could take the vehicles on test drives, the court heard.
He has pleaded guilty to the firearm offence, three counts of theft and single charges of armed robbery, breaching bail, unlicensed driving and dealing with the suspected proceeds of crime.
Chaouk, 25, a son of murdered crime patriarch Macchour Chaouk and the younger brother of Mohamed Ali Chaouk – who was shot dead by police during a 2005 raid – was fuelled by drugs when he stole the cars and motorbike between January and March last year, after separately telling the owners he was interested in buying them, the court was told.
While driving one car, Ms Parkes said, Chaouk showed the handgun to the car's owner. When the owner asked what the gun was for, Chaouk told him "Serbians were after him and he needed to get away", the prosecutor said.
The owner got out after Chaouk became increasingly angry. He drove away and the car was never returned.
In the preceding weeks, the court heard, Chaouk had driven the other car on a test drive. He had stopped the car and asked that its owner put a $50 note in someone's letterbox. When the man got out, Chaouk drove away, Ms Parkes said.
He also stole the Harley-Davidson after taking it for a test run, she said.
Defence counsel Grace Morgan said Chaouk's drug use was "out of control" at the time, as he was smoking ice daily and also using GHB.
Ms Morgan asked judge Damian Murphy for her client to be assessed to determine whether his low IQ and mental-health problems contributed to his offending, which could show his moral culpability was reduced.
Judge Murphy remanded Chaouk in custody to return to court in December. He has spent 559 days in custody since his arrest.
