By Aneeka Simonis
A LABERTOUCHE dairy farmer whose life spun out of control after becoming addicted to ice has been released on a community corrections order after pleading guilty to intentionally causing two bushfires during peak danger season.
On Tuesday 5 July at Latrobe Valley County Court, the 27-year-old arsonist was given a 176-day jail term for lighting fires at McDonalds Road in Labertouche and Labertouche Creek Bushland Reserve and possessing drugs in late December last year.
However, he had already served the time in pre-sentence detention and was released on an 18-month community corrections order.
About 4.30pm on Tuesday 29 December, the man known to suffer from significant mental health problems, drove his manager’s car from the Labertouche Road dairy farm where he worked to farming properties and open paddocks on McDonalds Road.
He pulled out a jerry can of fuel and cigarette lighter, setting fire to a couch that had been dumped roadside before driving away.
Longwarry CFA were called out to extinguish the fire which burned about 50 metres along the road and into a stock paddock.
About 8pm that night, the man drove a quad bike from his farm to the car park off Jacksons Track, Labertouche, and used a cigarette lighter to set 11 separate fires, some to rubbish found at the site.
The largest fire burnt half an acre of bush and grassland.
Five CFA trucks were called to extinguish the fires that were lit on the 25.5 degree summer day. Winds were reported as travelling up to nine kilometres per hour.
Early the next day, the arsonist took a train to Bairnsdale where he was arrested. He was also found in possession of methylamphetamine.
In a police interview, the man admitted to lighting both fires.
He said he was annoyed rubbish had been left on the roadside and believed that he had been acting appropriately by burning the rubbish.
The man spent his time in custody at the Melbourne Assessment Prison’s psychiatric unit.
The court heard the man appeared to be a “law-abiding, perfectly productive person” until he was 25 when he was introduced to ice, and developed schizophrenia.
Judge Gaynor said the drug had had a “catastrophic and disastrous effect” on the man’s life, and use of the drug has caused him to “behave in a dangerous offending” way.
The man has served previous criminal sentences over charges including reckless conduct endangering life, intentionally damaging property, burglary and theft, and being an unlicensed person possessing a firearm.
