Shane Anthony Horne pleads guilty to ram raid on Playhouse Adult Store at Biggera Waters

A man who used to a stolen ute to ram raid a Gold Coast sex shop and steal a number of x-rated items was planning to build a bunker to ride out the COVID-19 pandemic.

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A MAN who used to a stolen ute to ram raid a Gold Coast sex shop has pleaded guilty from prison.

Shane Anthony Horne appeared via video link from prison when he pleaded guilty in the Southport Magistrates Court to almost 50 charges including dangerous operation of a motor vehicle, fraud, enter premises to commit an indictable offence, stealing, unlawful use of a motor vehicle, driving without a licence and possessing dangerous drugs.

Horne used a stolen Toyota HiLux to smash through the front doors at low speed of the Playhouse Adult Store at Biggera Waters on April 5, 2020.

He took a number of sex toys and lingerie from the store.

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The sex shop theft was a part on an ongoing crime spree Horne engaged in between April 2019 and April last year.

A majority of the offences occurred between February and April last year.

During the time the rigger broke into a number of business and stole items including an excavator, trailers, a number of motor bikes, leaf blowers, mowers, power tools, a CCTV camera battery and other power tools.

The thefts occurred across the Gold Coast from Stapylton to Nerang.

Defence lawyer Michael Gatenby, of Gatenby Criminal Lawyers said: “He thought that COVID was the beginning of higher end of the world.

“He was getting fuel and other goods so he could go and prepare a bunker.

“He saw people on the news in body bags and became very afraid.”

Horne was linked to all the break-ins either through finger prints, blood left at the scene or being captured on CCTV.

Horne was only caught when police spotted him in a stolen car and followed him to Nerang on April 9 last year.

When police tried to approach him, Horne rammed the police car twice, and took off.

He drove the wrong way down the M1, stopped near Robina and was found by the dog squad in bushland nearby.

Magistrate Pam Dowse questioned whether she had jurisdiction to sentence Horne.

Magistrates only have the power to impose prison sentences of up to three years.

“Hearing those facts I am outraged and I don’t know if three years is enough,” she said.

“It’s horrific... nobody is safe from him... business, houses, cars.”

Shane Anthony Horne was sentenced to three years prison. Picture: Scott Fletcher.

Magistrate Dowse ultimately determined she would be able to handle the matter.

She sentenced Horne to three years prison with a parole release date on February 28. He will have spent 12 months in custody.

Magistrate Dowse also invoked a six month suspended sentence Horne was serving for other unrelated charges.

“We deplore your behaviour and nobody wants a person who does what you do having their freedom,” she said.

“Everybody works very hard to get their cars and houses and businesses and then you break in and destroy property.”

Mr Gatenby said Horne was kidnapped on January 1 last year and fled from police because he thought it was the kidnappers coming back.

He said Horne suffered from anxiety and depression.

Mr Gatenby said during the offending the “level of intoxication of drugs must have been significant”.

He said Horne was concerned he was not going to be able continue to pay his mortgage for a property in northern New South Wales.

Horne was charged with failure to provide the necessities of life after a woman was found unconscious on the side of the road in Maudsland in July 2019.

Police dropped those charges, offering no evidence.

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