Ryan Wicks jailed over couple’s Great Ocean Road nightmare, year-long crime spree

A drug-addled crook was in the midst of a months-long crime spree when he hijacked a campervan with a couple sleeping inside on the Great Ocean Road.

Brock Momcilovic and his partner Jedha Kinder endured a nightmare in a camper trailer when their car was hijacked. Mr Momcilovic’s car and camper trailer after the incident. Picture: Supplied

A drug-addled crook hijacked a campervan on the Great Ocean Road while a couple slept inside as part of a “self-destructive crime spree” that spanned a year and included dozens of offences.

Ryan Wicks, 20, appeared in the County Court via videolink from prison on Thursday to learn his fate, having pleaded guilty to 12 offences from August 2023.

Wallan couple Brock Momcilovic and Jedha Kinder were sleeping in their campervan hitched to Mr Momcilovic’s car at Cumberland River on August 19, 2023, when Wicks climbed into the car and began driving off.

Ms Kinder woke and tried to get out of the moving campervan but got tangled in the campervan’s annex with the couple’s two dogs and was dragged for a short distance until the canvas broke and she was left behind.

Mr Momcilovic “had to hang on for his life”, the court heard, before managing to grab his phone and call triple-0.

Wicks eventually ditched the car and campervan in Lorne after the clutch blew out.

The court heard Ms Kinder saw him walking back to Cumberland the next morning when she was picking up her scattered belongings from the road.

Days after the couple’s terrifying ordeal, Wicks and a co-offender burgled an Ocean Grove home.

Stolen items were found in a stolen car before the two men were arrested after being found in the roof cavity of a North Geelong home.

During his arrest, Wicks wrestled with police officers and bit a female officer on the thigh.

While in prison, Wicks tried to pervert the course of justice by trying to pressure a witness to change a statement he had made.

Judge Michael O’Connell jailed Wicks for a maximum of 30 months with a non-parole period of 18 months.

The sentence also took in two appeals heard by Judge O’Connell, which Wicks had launched against the severity of sentences he was handed by the Geelong Magistrates Court.

One of the appeal matters included 81 charges spanning October 2022 until June 2023, including thefts, burglaries, bail and drug offences.

The frequency and persistence of Wicks’ offending during the larger crime spree from October 2022 until October 2023, was “troubling”.

While rehabilitation must be a priority among sentencing considerations for youthful offenders, in Wicks’ case it must be moderated as Wicks had shown a “wilful disregard” to the court, Judge O’Connell said.

It was not in the community’s best interests, Judge O’Connell told the court, to release him onto a community corrections order (CCO), as his defence had argued for.

Judge O’Connell said he didn’t agree with a psychologist’s assessment that Wicks had good prospects of rehabilitation, telling the court Wicks prospects should be viewed with “much more circumspection”.

The court heard Wicks’ upbringing had been marred by “volatility and dysfunction”.

He struggled at school and left during year eight; during his teens he began using cannabis, but his drug use escalated to include GHB, Xanax and ice, the court heard.

Wicks has spent 418 days behind bars.

Originally published as Ryan Wicks jailed over couple’s Great Ocean Road nightmare, year-long crime spree