A man is facing deportation after being jailed for "the worst case of driving" a magistrate has seen in his career, including instances of ramming strangers' vehicles and speeding at more than 200 km/h.
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New Zealand national Shaun Michael Church's 75 offences took place between August 2019 and December 2020.
The Bendigo Magistrates' Court heard that on the evening of November 20 last year, the 28-year-old borrowed a Nissan Patrol ute from a colleague who he worked with near Pyramid Hill to pick up a dog kennel from the Bendigo area.
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He was driving south on the Bendigo-Pyramid Road about 80 km/h when the four victims approached from behind in a Holden hatchback and followed behind for a short while before overtaking.
The distance between the two vehicles grew to about a kilometre, but a few kilometres out from Raywood the victims noticed Church was closing the gap, with all headlights and accessory lights on the ute switched on.
Church got within a car's length of the hatchback, backed off momentarily, then approached closely again, repeating this a number of times while also swerving from side to side.
The victims became increasingly worried for their safety, and on the approach into Raywood, the driver slowed and signalled for Church to overtake him, before moving to the left of the road.
But Church instead accelerated heavily and crashed into the rear of the hatchback, causing it to lose control and drive off the road.
He then continued driving towards Bendigo.
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Two of the victims prepared impact statements that were read to the court, in which they described how this incident caused them anxiety about driving.
The following month, a woman, her partner and their 15-month-old child were in their vehicle in Bendigo when they saw Church get into a Ford car the woman had sold to another woman in August.
The woman and Church had previously exchanged heated messages on Facebook after the woman was informed the car had been involved with police and still registered to her. Social media users had told her Church had been driving the Ford.
The woman's partner got out of the vehicle and ran towards Church, who swerved at him and the woman's vehicle, forcing her to drive onto the nature strip to avoid being hit.
Church also narrowly missed hitting an elderly woman.
He later sent a message to the woman referring to her partner as a "mutt" and a "gronk".
Then on the evening of December 11, an officer in a patrol vehicle outside the Raywood police station saw Church approach in a Ford vehicle that was in poor condition.
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Church accelerated heavily and continued to do so as he drove towards Bendigo, the officer estimating his speed to be above 160 km/h.
Later that evening, police officers saw the Ford in View Street, Bendigo, and were aware of the previous incident in Raywood.
They followed Church onto Mitchell Street and activated their lights to pull him over, but instead he accelerated heavily.
He turned onto Myers Street and braked heavily at a red light at the Williamson Street intersection, putting the vehicle into a skid, but drove through the red light anyway.
Church committed numerous other driving offences elsewhere in the state.
The previous December, Church deliberately rammed another vehicle that had overtaken his, before pulling in front of it over double white lines and braking heavily to force it to run into his car.
He did not stop and made an offensive gesture with his middle finger as he drove away.
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Then last July, police detected him speeding at 211 km/h in a 100 km/h zone, and witnessed him crossing onto the wrong side of the road and overtaking despite an oncoming vehicle, at Leongatha after he failed to stop on their direction.
At Cobains, near Sale, Church bumped into the back of another vehicle in August 2019 after following too closely behind.
Church also used another person's debit card to make multiple purchases.
Throughout his offending, Church was banned from driving or unlicensed, and often using unregistered vehicles.
This week, Church sought a sentencing indication in the Bendigo Magistrates' Court.
His lawyer, Nicholas Rolfe, told the court that Church's concern was that he would receive a sentence of 12 months or more, which would trigger his deportation from Australia upon release.
Magistrate Patrick Southey said such a sentence was unlikely, given his previous history of driving offences.
"In nine years as a magistrate... This might be the worst spate of driving I've ever heard of," Mr Southey said.
Appearing via video link from the Metropolitan Remand Centre, Church asked the magistrate why he could not place him on a lengthy community corrections order.
"Because I'm not going to have you kill someone, Mr Church," Mr Southey replied.
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Mr Rolfe said Church's plea would hold significant utilitarian benefit, and told the court Church's partner was pregnant.
But Mr Southey said he could not take the impact of Church's eventual deportation on family into account.
The court heard Church would not be eligible for parole if given a sentence with a parole period.
Mr Southey said he would sentence Church to a straight 18 months' imprisonment if he were to plead guilty.
After some discussion between Mr Rolfe and Church, and a further plea to Mr Southey to reduce the sentence to below one year, Church accepted the sentence indication and pleaded guilty to 75 charges.
These included dangerous driving, unlicensed driving, careless driving, reckless conduct endangering life, reckless conduct endangering serious injury, speeding, contravening bail, obtaining property by deception, and failing to stop on police direction, among others.
Mr Southey said Church's repeated offending was "staggering", and he was lucky he had not killed anyone.
"The summaries [of offending] were just terrifying," Mr Southey said.
In this case, he said, the primary purposes of sentencing were the protection of the community and deterring Church from further offending.
Mr Southey took into account Church's guilty plea, noting the matters could have tied up the courts for weeks if they were contested.
He sentenced Church to a straight 18 months' imprisonment, of which 28 days had already been served.
Church was also disqualified from driving for three years.
But for Church's guilty plea, he would have faced up to three years in prison.
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