Man jailed after knife threat for car
A Kalgoorlie man who threatened a 68-year-old retiree with a knife, intending to steal the victim's car, has been jailed for three-and-a-half years.
Wielding a knife with a 20cm blade, Ronald James Lawson told the elderly man he "might as well make it easy" and let him steal the car, the WA Supreme Court heard on Tuesday.
It was the second time that day the 19-year-old had tried to take the car from the same house, having stolen a set of keys during a burglary earlier.
As he handed down the jail sentence, Justice Peter Martino spoke of the lasting damage Lawson's actions caused to the victim, noting the 68-year-old "now feels imprisoned in his own home".
Lawson and another man involved in the robbery were lurking in a laneway behind the house about 11pm on October 16 last year.
They jumped the fence and entered the man's house through the back door, grabbing a set of car keys in the process.
As they searched for more items to steal, however, the two men were disturbed by the man's dog and fled the house.
Two hours later, the pair returned to the house with the intention of stealing the car and were confronted by the victim.
Lawson produced the knife and pointed it at the man, telling him to go back inside.
Fearing for his safety, the 68-year-old began to walk back to his house, but Lawson and the other man began to throw rocks at him.
The man was hit on the arm, suffering bleeding and swelling, and called out to a neighbour for help.
Lawson had also pleaded guilty to breaking into a car less than a week before the armed robbery.
On October 10 last year, he forced open the window of a Holden Barina and took an iPod, a Bluetooth immobiliser and a Bluetooth microphone.
Defence counsel Wendy Hughes asked Justice Martino to consider Lawson's youth when handing down a jail term.
"His youth is an indication of not only the fact that he's a young person who makes poor decisions and lacks consequential thinking but also the recidivism … seen in the record," she said.
Lawson was given three-and-a-half years jail, which will be served cumulatively on the remainder of a custodial sentence imposed in 2012.
Lawson was on a supervised release order in relation to the previous term when he committed the 2014 offences.
