It is no longer possible for the ACT Magistrates Court to "share the same optimism" as a higher court about a former drug "kingpin" after he ended up being tasered in a chicken coop-style shed while fleeing from police officers, a judicial officer said as she sentenced the offender.
Thor Sven Kristiansen, 33, appeared via audio-visual link in the Magistrates Court on Thursday after pleading guilty to 13 charges, including assaulting a police officer, resisting police and unauthorised possession of a firearm.
Court documents state that on March 18 last year, ACT Policing pulled Kristiansen over during a patrol in Chifley and told him he was under arrest for breaching parole.
He fled the scene, prompting a chase into a backyard where he entered a chicken coop-like storage shed.
There, he looked around frantically for what could be used as a weapon, but once police reached him, he was tasered.
However, he got back onto his feet and ran out, leading to more police attempts to arrest him.
He was tasered again.
He also grabbed an officer's arm before jumping onto a trailer to try to jump a fence, but the trailer collapsed on him, allowing his arrest.
Kristiansen was released on parole in February 24 last year and one of the conditions was for him not to contact his on-and-off-again partner.
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On the same day he was released, the pair shared a meal at a McDonald's restaurant.
In June 2020, Kristiansen also resisted police officers when they approached him at a Kambah premises.
"The defendant was highly agitated and wearing only a bath towel around his waist," the statement of facts read.
He yelled at the police: "F--- off ... what are you going to do - shoot me?"
He then sat inside a Volkswagen and revved it before reversing it into a police car.
Officers had to use capsicum spray, a Taser and a canine to finally bring him down.
They then found numerous stolen items in the car, including replica guns.
During sentencing, magistrate Beth Campbell said the offender had "not taken full advantage of the leniency offered to him in the past".
Ms Campbell said this included now-retired Justice John Burns' sentence of a community-based order in the Supreme Court in 2017, which she said was "clearly aimed at his reformation into a law-abiding member of the community".
The former judge re-sentenced Kristiansen to a "low non-parole" term when he breached that order.
Ms Campbell said "it is no longer possible for the court to share the same optimism" that the Supreme Court had in 2017 about the offender's ability not to commit offences while serving a community-based sentence.
"However, I also accept there was a time when a very experienced and respected judicial officer accepted, on all information before him, that the defendant's expression of remorse and his commitment to reform were genuine," she said.
"It's my hope but I cannot say that it is an expectation based on sound evidence that this may be the case again upon the defendant's release from the penalties that I'm required to impose today."
Ms Campbell said no recent evidence about his remorse or regret had been tendered.
She said the offender's instances of resisting police officers in June 2020 "are certainly among the more serious examples of this type of offending in my experience in the Magistrates Court".
She sentenced Kristiansen to 26 months jail backdated to January with a non-parole period of 17 months, meaning he will be eligible for release in May 2023.
The sentence was also for a number of driving offences.
