High-speed escape to the country lands Mitchell man behind bars
A visit to the big smoke went wrong for this Mitchell man, who made a ‘ham-fisted’ attempt at stealing.
Moreton
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A country boy stole two rego plates and sped away from police in a desperate attempt to return home to regional Queensland, the Pine Rivers Magistrates Court heard on October 29.
Steven Lee Nixon-McKellar, 28, pleaded guilty to two charges of stealing a registration plate and one charge of dangerous operation of a motor vehicle.
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The court heard Nixon-McKellar travelled the 587 km from Mitchell, a small town in the Maranoa region, to Brisbane to visit his cousin.
Some time later, however, Nixon-McKellar was told he was no longer welcome and was asked to leave.
Duty lawyer for the defence Bevan Manthey told the court Nixon-McKellar had no money to pay for petrol, so made a “ham-fisted attempt” at replacing the registration plates on his Ford Falcon sedan with those of a Ford Ranger from Ashgrove.
“He put them on the car, gone and did a fuel run, then tried to head back to Mitchell when he was intercepted,” Mr Manthey said.
“He took off from police because he didn’t want to get locked up, he wanted to get back to Mitchell and he panicked.”
The court heard Nixon-McKeller was spotted by police travelling at a high speed with his headlights off at around 1am on September 28.
Police were unable to successfully intercept the car until a few hours later when it was spotted again, this time was observed entering Bunya Park Dr, a dead end road.
Nixon-McKeller, who was out on a suspended prison sentence for several prior offences at the time, was taken back to the watch-house and remained in custody since.
He was convicted and sentenced to a further six months imprisonment for each charge and disqualified from driving for six months.