Man jailed for firing sawn-off rifle across busy southern suburbs road

An Adelaide judge rejected the man’s reason for firing a sawn-off rifle across a major road in broad daylight before delivering a blunt threat.

A judge has verbally lashed a “juvenile and drug addicted” man who threatened to “shoot a man in the dick” after firing a gun at him across a busy Adelaide road in broad daylight.

The 34-year-old man, whose identity is suppressed, was jailed for over a decade after he was caught red-handed on camera.

During sentencing on Monday, the court heard the bullet crossed Dyson Rd and pierced the glass shop front of a local business in April 2020, leaving a large bullet hole.

The court heard the intended target owed the man money from a drug debt.

Video footage of the incident tendered in the District Court and released to The Advertiser shows the man pulling up on Dyson Rd at Christies Beach and firing a single shot from a suppressed sawn-off rifle.

Another video then shows the man driving at high-speed to chase after the victim.

Neither video can be shown publicly without identifying the criminal, who has now had his name and image suppressed by the court.

“When you caught up with him, you stopped the car and said ‘where’s my money, where’s my money’ and produced a firearm,” Judge Liesl Kudelka said.

The victim managed to grab the barrel of the firearm through the drivers window.

“You said to him “let go of my gun or I will shoot you in the dick’,” Judge Kudelka said.

The court heard the man then punched the victim and waved the firearm at him, laughing as he ran away.

The man pleaded guilty to discharging a firearm to injure, frighten or annoy, threatening to cause harm and possessing a firearm.

Judge Kudelka said she rejected his claim that it was a flight or fight response as the victim had shot at him earlier.

“You appeared calm, deliberate and in control,” she said.

“Noone wants immature, juvenile and drug addicted people like you in possession of such weapons.”

The court heard the man then tried to convince a witness to the shooting to provide police with a false account.

The man was also sentenced for 62 counts of drug trafficking, relating to an enterprise in the southern suburbs.
Judge Kudelka said the man, who was buying and selling large quantities of methamphetamine, would have been making considerable profit.

The court heard the man started using methamphetamine in his teenage years before he “went off the rails” later in life.

Judge Kudelka sentenced him to 12 years and three months jail, with a non-parole period of nine years and 10 months.

The sentence was backdated to August 15, 2022.