Man jailed for violent Christmas burglary

A 37-year-old Albany man who assaulted a child in a violent home burglary on Christmas eve in the middle of a methamphetamine-fuelled burglary spree last year has been jailed for two years.

Michael Sanderson was yesterday sentenced on seven charges in Albany District Court, from the burglary spree on Christmas Eve where almost $3000 of property was stolen from two homes in the morning.

Sanderson pleaded guilty yesterday to aggravated burglary, two counts of burglary, assault occasioning bodily harm and three counts of stealing.

The court was told Sanderson, a father-of-three, had been using methamphetamine heavily for a month and was under the influence of the drug when he entered a home in Robinson at around 8am and assaulted a 16-year-old boy.

State prosecutor Raymond Soh said Sanderson was in an “aggressive and controlling manner” when he crept up behind the boy who was using the family computer.

The court heard the boy then alerted his 12-year-old brother and grabbed his compound bow and fired an arrow at Sanderson who threatened him with a raised chair.

The boy was then punched to the face and had his eyes gouged in a scuffle on the living room floor before running with his brother to their neighbours to alert police.

Sanderson was confronted by the boy’s mother as she arrived home from shopping before leaving in his car.

He had earlier stolen $1600 of motocross gear from another home in Robinson and was eventually arrested committing another burglary at a home in McKail where $1050 of property was taken and then recovered by police.

Defence lawyer Tony Chilvers said Sanderson had been using illicit substances recently to get over “hard spots” in his life and had been using methamphetamine heavily in the lead-up to the offences.

Mr Chilvers said his client had not acknowledged the “considerable distress” his offending had on the victim’s family until recently reading a victim impact statement from the two boys and their mother, and urged Judge Vicky Stewart to consider a suspended prison term.

Judge Stewart said Sanderson had gone to the boy’s home when it was apparent people were at the house and a prison term was the only appropriate sentencing option.

“Those two boys would have been terrified ... it has had a lasting emotional effect on the entire family,” Judge Stewart said.

“I have to protect the public from this type of behaviour.

“You must get off methamphetamine; you saw what it did to you.”

Judge Stewart said the offences were too serious to consider suspending the prison term when jailing Sanderson for 24 months. He was made eligible for parole with the sentence backdated to February after spending eight months in custody.