A 16-YEAR-OLD youth involved in trying to rob a Timboon drug dealer at knifepoint has been placed on a 12-month youth supervision order.
A magistrate warned the youth that if he continued with the same behaviour he was headed for jail.
He said similar offending committed in Portland during the past couple of years had led to the death of a man.
Police said that on June 12 this year two youths travelled by bus from Camperdown to Timboon, where they met two other people.
One of the four went to an address in Timboon and was invited in to buy cannabis.
While leaving he held open a screen door and allowed two offenders lying in wait to enter the property wearing balaclavas, latex gloves and armed with a metal pipe and part of a hockey stick.
The victim was grabbed in a bear hug and threatened to have his skull bashed in if all the dealer’s cash and drugs was not handed over.
The victim pleaded not to be hurt before grabbing one of his attackers and pulling off his balaclava.
A bag containing 14 grams of cannabis was located and one of the intruders armed himself with a black-handled steak knife, threatening to cut the victim if he did not cooperate.
The intruders obtained keys to a vehicle, during which the victim got free and armed himself with a knife. The two offenders then ran off and the incident was reported to police, who recovered the gloves, balaclavas and the steak knife.
Four days later the youth was also involved in breaking into the Noorat Primary School, where two laptop computers were stolen, which were recovered undamaged, and a bus shelter was vandalised.
The defendant told police he was involved in the aggravated burglary to “get weed and get stoned”. A co-offender has previously been sentenced to serve six months in a youth detention centre.
The magistrate said the offending was well thought-out. He said reports on the youth indicated he had not had an easy start to his life and had unfortunately fallen in with a group of young people for whom cannabis use was one of the most important aspects of their lives.
The magistrate warned that cannabis use often led to irreversible brain damage.