A Ballarat man who stole a wallet from a man during his shift at a local bottle shop has been jailed.
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Patrick Meizys, 22, who appeared via videolink to the Ballarat Magistrate Court, pleaded guilty to one count of theft.
The court heard the accused and a friend attended the popular Ballarat bottle shop in May, where he was seen on camera stealing an employee’s wallet from behind the counter while the employee helped his friend.
Meizys, who is currently serving a sentence for armed robbery, refused to be interviewed over the matter.
His lawyer, Manny Brennan, said his client came from a disadvantaged background and was using ice at the time. Describing the offending as opportunistic, magistrate Cynthia Toose sentenced Meizys to a one-month jail term to be served concurrently with his current term. He is due to be released in November 2017.
In a separate case a Bacchus Marsh man who was found hiding on two separate occasions at a property he was banned from attending was jailed for two months.
Campbell Hughes pleaded guilty to one count each of breaching an intervention order and contravening a community corrections order.
The court heard police found Hughes hiding under a bed on one occasion and outside on another, despite a family violence intervention order banning him from the property. His lawyer, Mike Wardell, said Hughes, who is currently serving a four-month jail term on unrelated matters, did not breach the order again after he was found the second time.
Magistrate Toose told Hughes the offending was not victimless.
“The victims are your children. When they go to bed they see you being hauled off by the police,” she said.
She sentenced Hughes to a two-month concurrent jail term and order he complete the 18-month CCO.
A third man was fined $2000 with conviction after pleading guilty to drink driving, driving unlicenced and driving an unregistered car.
The man recorded a blood alcohol reading of 0.163.
