A former Queenstown woman’s addiction to thievery was driven by her methamphetamine addiction, a court has heard.
Shayna Marie Hallett (24), unemployed, was sentenced to nine months’ home detention in the Queenstown District Court yesterday for a string of thefts and other offending earlier this year.
A police summary of facts said between March and May, Hallett committed five acts of theft in Invercargill and Riverton, with her victims including Mitre 10 and Farmers stores and a New World supermarket.
In Queenstown, on July 3, she stole two avalanche transceivers, valued at $1698, from the Small Planet Sports store.
Two days later, in Cromwell, she stole various items from New World, a Paperplus store and a clothing shop.
Hallett was also sentenced on charges of aggravated disqualified driving, in Cromwell’s Harvest Rd, on July 2, and being unlawfully in a building, between July 7 and 16, in Cromwell.
In the case of the latter charge, she found an unoccupied house in the town, from where she began selling stolen items on a social media trading site.
Counsel Megan Waller said the defendant had moved away from bad influences in Invercargill, and was now living in Hastings, where she had family support.
She wanted to become more involved in the raising of her baby son, who was now in the care of the defendant’s mother.
Judge Bernadette Farnan said the defendant’s methamphetamine use was the main driver of her offending.
Although the shoplifting could be partly attributed to financial hardship, she had become ‘‘addicted’’ to the activity.
In sentencing, she took account of the defendant’s guilty plea and the steps she had taken to address the underlying causes of her offending, settling on a term of 18 months’ prison.
That was converted to nine months’ home detention, with post-detention conditions for six months, to enable intervention for her drug and alcohol issues.
Hallett must also pay a total of $2170.12 reparation to her victims, and is disqualified from driving for 12 months.
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