Larry Enrico Pucci sentenced over shopping centre raids
Discarded gloves, CCTV footage and incriminating travel patterns have sent an unrepentant shopping centre raider to prison. Here’s the latest from court.
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An Alstonville man has been jailed over an after-hours series of daring raids at a popular Coffs Coast shopping centre.
A district court judge found that Larry Enrico Pucci risked institutionalisation and harsh incarceration when sentencing him over the spate of burglaries more than four years ago.
The 40-year-old received an aggregate term of imprisonment of four years with a non-parole period of two years and six months on May 22 at Coffs Harbour.
Discarded gloves, CCTV footage and incriminating travel patterns sealed Pucci’s fate during his trial, when the jury found him guilty of seven counts of break and enter while armed with an offensive weapon, two counts of theft and two counts of entering a building with intent to commit an indictable offence.
During the two week trial, Crown prosecutor senior counsel David Morters argued forensic evidence linked Pucci to the crimes, namely a glove found the next day by a dog walker on a Sapphire Beach Headland less than 2km from the scene of the crime – Moonee Marketplace, a short drive north of Coffs Harbour.
In the after hours crime spree on September 15, 2020, Pucci hit the Black Apple Cafe, Moon Dragon Chinese Restaurant, Russell’s Prime Quality Meats, Rosies, Kez’s Sweet Life, Outpost Hair, the post office, Taj and Co restaurant and Aloy Dee Thai.
During his defence, self-represented Pucci claimed police misconduct suggesting his DNA had been “lifted” and “planted” in the gloves.
Mr Morters presented what was described as circumstantial evidence to the jury which he argued put Pucci in the vicinity of the crimes committed in the early hours of September 14, 2020.
The court was shown CCTV footage of the crimes and heard audio files police claimed were Pucci ordering a taxi to a Sapphire Beach intersection, approximately three and half miles from the marketplace the day before the overnight crimes occurred.
The jury found Pucci guilty on December 10.
Due to time already spent in custody, Pucci will be eligible for parole on May 11, 2026.
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