QLD:Dionne Lacey wins sentence appeal

AAP General News (Australia)
04-07-2011
QLD:Dionne Lacey wins sentence appeal

By Lisa Martin

BRISBANE, April 7 AAP - A Gold Coast millionaire's son serving time for manslaughter
will have a year shaved off his 11-year sentence after he won a High Court appeal.

Dionne Lacey, 24, the son of millionaire milkman Ken Lacey, was jailed in May 2009
for 10 years for the fatal shooting of Nerang landscaper Kevin Palmer in 2007.

He was found guilty of Mr Palmer's manslaughter.

His brother, 28-year-old Jade Lacey, also known as wannabe rapper "Lace Italiano",
was jailed for five years for unlawful wounding over shooting Mr Palmer in the leg before
Dionne Lacey fired the fatal bullet.

During sentencing, the crown prosecutor had said an appropriate sentence for Dionne
Lacey would be 13 years before deducting two years for time already served.

Attorney-General Cameron Dick took the matter to the Court of Appeal in Brisbane seeking
an increase in the 10-year sentence.

He argued the offence was the most serious of its kind and asked the court to consider
a range of 13 to 16 years after the deduction.

Queensland Court of Appeal judges decided to increase Lacey's jail time by one year.

But a High Court judgment released on Thursday overturned that decision.

It said the appeal court had increased the sentence without identifying any error by
the sentencing judge.

The judgment said an attorney-general's appeal "should be exercised sparingly ... and
not merely for the purpose of having a "second bite at the cherry".

"The majority stated, in increasing the sentence imposed on the appellant, that they
bore in mind 'the importance of the consideration that appeals ... must not be seen as
a means for the prosecution to change its mind as to the level of sentence it is disposed
to seek'," the High Court judges said.

Dionne Lacey has been identified as a serious violent offender and will have to serve
80 per cent of his prison sentence before being eligible for parole.

The Lacey brothers are also serving six-year sentences for torturing a teenager over
stolen drugs in 2007.

Crown prosecutors presented a further indictment against the duo in the Brisbane Supreme
Court on Thursday for alleged trafficking of ecstasy and cocaine possession in 2006 and
2007.

The brothers' girlfriends, Michelle Luangkhoth and Rebecca Klodinsky, are also facing
charges of drug possession.

The case will return to court for mention on April 29.

AAP lpm/tnf/jl/nb

KEYWORD: LACEY

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