Queanbeyan man who hid tracker in toy frog refused bail by ACT Magistrates Court over alleged stalking

The 57-year-old Queanbeyan man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was arrested in June and detained in a mental health unit for more than a month before he was refused bail on Monday afternoon.

Documents tendered to the ACT Magistrates Court show the man was, in 2018, served with a family violence order that, among other things, prohibited him from trying to locate his former partner.

The following year, he took a plastic shopping bag full of toys to a supervised visit with his daughter and later offered the items to his former partner for the girl to keep.

When the man's former partner subsequently looked at the toys, she found a "tick tracker" hidden in the bottom of a green plastic frog and reported the discovery.

Police arrested the man for breaching the order and discovered his phone contained a tracking application, which was recording the movements of a device that had been at the same location where officers had met with his former partner earlier that day.

They accordingly phoned the former partner and asked her to come to City Police Station, then watched as a tracking pin on the man's phone showed the woman's journey there.

When she arrived, officers found he had hidden a further tracking device hidden in a wheel well on her vehicle.

MORE COURT AND CRIME NEWS:

The offender was subsequently convicted of stalking and contravening the family violence order, which a magistrate later extended for 50 years.

He was back in court again on Monday after being arrested on June 21 and charged with another stalking offence, as well as two more counts of contravening a family violence order.

Police documents allege he committed those offences in May and June by appearing at his seven-year-old daughter's ACT school and at a sporting match, despite no longer being allowed within 100 metres of her.

He allegedly approached the child from behind at the sporting match and advanced to within one metre of her and his former partner, leaving them "extremely frightened, both crying and visibly shaking".

Through defence lawyer Paul Edmonds, the 57-year-old pleaded not guilty to each of the new charges when he faced court, following more than a month in the Dhulwa mental health unit, on Monday.

Mr Edmonds applied for the man to be released on bail, saying the defendant was now medicated, subject to a psychiatric treatment order and aware of the existence of the family violence order.

He said he was instructed the man had not been served with a copy of the order when it was last extended in March, questioning whether it was therefore "binding" at the time of the latest alleged offending.

Mr Edmonds said the uncertainty around this would leave the court with "at least a slight sense of disquiet", adding that it may be that "an innocent man is being remanded in custody".

Prosecutor James Melloy conceded there were "difficulties" in relation to the two new charges of contravening a family violence order, but he said the latest stalking allegation was a different story.

He said the 57-year-old had received a sentence of imprisonment within the last two years for the previous stalking offence, and the man's history of breaching family violence orders showed the defendant was incapable of complying with conditions.

Mr Melloy added that the man's former partner was "terrified" and would likely have to relocate if the 57-year-old was released.

Magistrate Robert Cook ultimately refused bail, saying he was concerned the man was likely to commit crimes and endanger the safety and welfare of the alleged victims if released.

He noted that the man's criminal history showed his former partner and child had been "victims of [his] over a number of years".

The court heard the man planned to apply for bail again on Friday, but he is otherwise due to reappear on September 6.

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content: