Source : Perth Now news
A mother of three found with an extraordinary haul of stolen Lego stashed in her shed has been spared jail.
Dai Truong, 34, last week admitted four charges relating to a $320,000 stolen Lego stash discovered by police in her Dudley Park home in Adelaide earlier this year.
Truong, now of Devon Park, pleaded guilty to one count of unlawful possession and three counts of dealing with property without consent following the raid on her former home on March 31.
Police attending the property discovered a mountain of brand new Lego sets, from Star Wars to Disney, stashed away in a garden shed.
Such was the extent of the haul, it took 15 pallets and two horse boxes to remove them from the home.
Port Adelaide Magistrates Court did not hear the full origins of the entire stash, but Vietnamese national Truong admitted to possessing it and three instances in which she stole from the same Kmart branch.
The court was told of a trio of thefts in which Truong smuggled boxes of Lego from the Marion Shopping Centre branch in the base compartment of her child’s pram.
The three incidents happened weeks apart from one another and she only stole a handful of boxes each time.
However, they accounted for a very small proportion of the mountain discovered by officers when they raided the property.
A week on from her guilty pleas, Truong returned to the same court to hear her sentence.
And despite warnings that she would face a custodial sentence, she will avoid spending time in jail.
Instead, magistrate Aaron Almedia agreed to a home detention order, meaning she will serve her sentence from her home.
For the single count of unlawful possession, relating to the entire haul, Truong was sentenced to seven months imprisonment – reduced to four months and six days due to her entering guilty pleas at the earliest opportunity.
The magistrate also ordered Truong to pay compensation to Kmart Marion in relation to the stolen goods.
She was ordered to pay the store $1774 to cover the value of her three thefts – $874, $600 and $300 respectively.
She was also ordered to pay the court $1112 in victim-of-crime levies.
