A Dunedin burglar who ransacked an entire home and got away with priceless personal items has been sentenced to home detention.
Michael Jason Kapa (43) appeared in the Dunedin District Court last month after pleading guilty to the break-in at the South Dunedin house.
He will spend the next 10 months housebound at his own address and Judge Michael Crosbie said the defendant could easily have been locked up.
Among the items Kapa made off with on the night of April 7 last year were a World War 1 medal and a laptop.
While not worth a huge amount, they had huge importance to their owners, the court heard.
One of the victims — a PhD student at the time — had his computer stolen, which contained weeks of work on his thesis that had not been backed up.
The owner of the medal said the gift from his grandfather had "immense sentimental value".
The judge said that aspect of the crime was particularly heartless.
"It’s a cruel and senseless aspect of any burglary, the taking of medals from whanau who put their life on the line," he said.
"Often it is the most significant way for family to remember them."
The flatmates had held a flat-warming at the house before heading into town to continue the celebrations.
While the property was vacant, Kapa got in.
The court heard he went through every room, pulling out drawers and emptying the contents over the floor.
One of the victims said she had never felt so violated than when she returned to find her belongings strewn everywhere.
When Kapa had selected what he wanted, he used the residents’ own bags to pack the goods up.
But before he could lug them all away, the group returned from town and disturbed him.
One woman, who had originally planned to come home early, ahead of her flatmates, said she felt "physically sick" to think of what might have happened had she bumped into Kapa alone.
Judge Crosbie went through the victim impact statements in detail and urged the defendant to "stand in their shoes for five minutes".
He gave Kapa leave to apply to have his sentence converted to something less restrictive after serving two-thirds of it.
"It would be nice to know by then a medal had found its way home," he said.
Kapa was ordered to pay $2049 reparation.
