Leon Desmond Solomon (29) was sentenced to three months’ community detention, and nine months’ supervision for breaching a protection order by possessing a firearm and ammunition, on January 4 this year.
On the day of the incident, Solomon was in the process of moving from Christchurch to Oamaru and about 5pm he uploaded a photo to his Facebook page of him holding a firearm pointed at a mirror.
He had been convicted in early 2020 on two charges of assaulting his former partner in late 2019. The pair had been in a relationship for more than 10 years at the time and had three children together.
On February 13 last year, a temporary protection order was placed against Solomon regarding his ex-partner, and the order became final three months later, on May 6.
She saw the defendant’s Facebook photo and, afraid for her safety, contacted police.
Later that night, police searched Solomon’s house and found a loaded .308 rifle and 17 rounds of ammunition.
Defence counsel Kathryn Henry said there had been no question of the defendant contacting his children’s mother, and no other breaches of the protection order.
Judge Dominic Dravitzki said although no direct threat was made to the victim, she was “extremely frightened’’ by the photo, and it was a standard condition of any protection order not to possess weapons.
The judge acknowledged that, other than the family violence convictions in 2020, Solomon had had no convictions since 2012. He had accepted responsibility for his offending.
He had the support of his mother in Oamaru, and was much more settled since moving from Christchurch.
The supervision sentence included special conditions as suggested in a pre-sentence report, and Solomon was ordered to attend any programmes deemed appropriate by his probation officer.
