The tougher regime has been backed by some victims’ advocates, but was criticised by legal groups and the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission.<\/p>\n
For adults, the minimum sentence for aggravated carjacking is three years’ jail.<\/p>\n
On Wednesday, County Court judge Scott Johns used his discretion to sentence the girl to an 18-month youth supervision order, letting her walk free.<\/p>\n
“You haven’t had a lot of opportunities in your young life. This is one,” Judge Johns told the girl.<\/p>\n
“I hope I don’t see you back here. If you don’t abide by the conditions of the order then I will, and I will have to look at significant consequences.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Conditions of the order include drug counselling, mental health treatment, attending school, TAFE or work, offender behaviour programs, community work and a curfew.<\/p>\n
Judge Johns described the carjacking as “very serious” and the victim as a “vulnerable, unsuspecting target”.<\/p>\n
He acknowledged parliament’s intent for youth aggravated carjackings to be dealt with more severely than under the rules of the Children’s Court, where the maximum penalty is three years in detention.<\/p>\n
However, he said, the law also allowed him to consider if “exceptional circumstances” applied and whether youth sentencing legislation could be used.<\/p>\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/579182d06a4661c13e42cb6917b250bb.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Judge Johns said a range of factors, including the incident being a first-time offence and a lack of family stability contributed to his ruling. (ABC News: Patrick Rocca)<\/p>\n
The girl fit the criteria, he said, for a number of reasons.<\/p>\n
She was a first-time offender, was remorseful and had kept out of trouble since her arrest, he noted.<\/p>\n
The girl’s father was in jail and her mother had a history of violence towards her, and the teen was living in residential care at the time of the carjacking.<\/p>\n
“Your 16 years have been marred by a profound lack of stability and safety,” he said.<\/p>\n
A psychologist also testified that the girl had PTSD and unmanaged ADHD, meaning she “tends to go along with things” without realising the consequences.<\/p>\n
Judge Johns said the public was best protected by the girl completing her rehabilitation in the community.<\/p>\n
“I accept this offence is out of character for you,” he told her.<\/p>\n
The girl’s co-offender, who was also 16 at the time, played a lesser role in the carjacking and was sentenced to a 12-month good behaviour bond by the Children’s Court.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The first teenager charged under Victoria’s “Adult Time for Violent Crime” laws has been spared jail, after a…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1024852,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2],"tags":[4740,19286,281,38932,6123,50,17024,8155,3983,67682],"class_list":["post-1024851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-australia","tag-carjacking","tag-court","tag-dandenong","tag-driver","tag-news","tag-sentencing","tag-taxi","tag-teenager","tag-youth-crime"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/117160860963538265","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1024851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1024851"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1024851\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1024852"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1024851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1024851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1024851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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<\/p>\n