Getaway driver Mitchell James Mervin sentenced for armed robbery and shooting at Tenambit

A man who threatened to stab a motorist and broke some of his bones before stealing a Holden Commodore, which would later transport four masked gunmen to a brazen dawn shooting in a small Hunter village, has learnt his fate.

CCTV of masked gunmen who peppered the front yard of a home on Goldingham St, Tenambit on October 16, 2022 where Maddison Hickson was staying. Picture: Channel 7.

First came the vicious beating of a man for his Holden Commodore, cracking two ribs and fracturing a collarbone while threatening to stab him with a knife if he didn't sign over the V8 for free.

And then, with the stolen car at his fingertips, Mitchell James Mervin used it to carry masked men to a footpath adjacent to a Hunter home, where the gunmen peppered the front yard with bullets from a pistol, a rifle and a shotgun during the brazen attack.

Mervin even stopped en route to the shooting to snap a photo of him and one of the balaclava-clad gunmen, armed with a shotgun and sitting in the front seat, after the plan had been hatched to shoot up the Tenambit home just after dawn on October 16, 2022.

Within hours, Mervin would be taken into custody over the car robbery after detectives used a tracking device within the Commodore to find the stolen car and Mervin with it.

The now 28-year-old drug addict, who has spent a significant amount of his adult life behind bars, will remain in prison until at least a few weeks before Christmas next year after being sentenced in Newcastle District Court on Friday.

Mitchell James Mervin, who drove the getaway car during a drive-by shooting on Goldingham St, Tenambit on October 16, 2022.

Mervin pleaded guilty to the armed robbery in company charge relating to the taking the man’s car two days before the shooting, as well as two charges relating to the shooting.

Judge Justin Smith, SC, sentenced Mervin to an aggregate maximum jail term of six years with a non-parole period of three years and two months, backdated to his arrested on the afternoon of the shooting.

CCTV of the targeted shooting at Tenambit in 2022.

It means he will not be eligible for parole until December 15, 2025.

The court had heard that Mervin had appeared to have finally turned the corner, admitting the life of drugs and crime was not for him anymore and appearing to his supportive mother to mean it for the first time as an adult.

It came after the court heard Mervin and another man had “lured” the Holden Commodore driver to a remote road after meeting him at the Hunter River Hotel at Maitland on October 14, 2022.

The pair had sent multiple text messages while in the car planning when to rob the man, before he was bashed as he sat in the driver’s seat and dragged outside where he was further assaulted and threatened with the knife and the stun gun.

Mitchell James Mervin

The court heard the man was threatened with death, with Mervin telling him: “Maybe I should stab you and then we won’t have to worry about the [car registration] transfer”.

The victim suffered a broken collarbone, two broken ribs, cuts to his head and body and serious bruising.

Mervin and his co-offender dropped the victim off and took the Commodore.

Then, before dawn on October 16, Mervin drove to Morpeth and continued to plan the targeted shooting of the Tenambit house, which

had significant links to Maddison Hickson, who was due to face court for the first day of her murder trial after she stabbed her violent standover man father to death.

Hickson, who admitted stabbing her father Michael Carroll, was acquitted of murder after arguing self defence and the shooting of the home was not related to the murder trial.

Mervin then drove the four masked men to a street behind the Goldingham St home about 6.40am, before CCTV caught them walking down a public path with the morning light beaming on their balaclavas.

Lone Wolf bikie Brian Maynard, also known as Bryan Maynard, who pleaded guilty over the Tenambit public place shooting.

Included in the foursome was Lone Wolf bikie Brian Maynard, who was sentenced to August a maximum four years and two months jail for his role in the shooting.

Maynard was on parole when he and the other three left Mervin in the car and before three of them fired their guns into the hire car parked in the driveway.

One bullet ricocheted off a window pane and ended up in a neighbour’s tree, while the fourth gunman battled unsuccessfully with a troublesome gun which never shot a projectile.

The four then ran back to Mervin and the stolen car before Mervin drove from the scene.