Phillip Carr pleads guilty to firearm storage crimes

The former chair of the Masonic Lodge and Upper Glastonbury grazier was convicted of several firearms charges.

Upper Glastonbury’s Phillip Carr has pleaded guilty to multiple charges relating to unsecurely stored weapons, ammunition and explosives.

Gympie Magistrate Chris Callaghan was clearly frustrated and bemused by firearm laws after a “pillar” of the community landed in court on unsecured weapons charges.

Phillip Edward Carr, 70, pleaded guilty to multiple firearms charges on Monday.

These included failing to store small ammunition in a secure area, failing to keep weapons in a secure place and possessing fireworks.

Police found the unsecured weapons while at Carr’s Upper Glastonbury property on March 7, on a matter relating to his son, the court was told.

While searching for Carr’s son they found an open weapon safe and small ammunition stored in an unlocked outbuilding.

The safe contained rifles with the bolts still attached, and fireworks.

The former raised Mr Callaghan’s eyebrows, prompting him to ask whether the bolts had to be removed from weapons and stored elsewhere.

Magistrate Chris Callaghan said the legislation requirements for safe storage were ridiculous.

He sighed in apparent bemusement when he was told the answer was “yes”.

“So they have to put (the bolts) into a second safe? That’s ridiculous,” he said.

The police prosecutor said the law outlined the weapon’s bolts be removed and then kept in a second safe.

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“That sounds incredible,” Mr Callaghan said.

He then went on to outline the absurdity further.

“If you see a vermin on your property you’ve got to go to one safe to get your bolt, then grab your gun from a second safe, then go to a third safe and get your ammunition?” he said.

“So you’ve got to have three safes?”

Carr pleaded guilty in Gympie Magistrates Court.

Not content to let the matter lie he then took out an iPad and dived into the Weapons Regulation 2016 legislation to see for himself.

Mr Callaghan then said, on his reading, “it doesn’t say it’s got to be in a separate safe”.

Carr’s lawyer agreed it was “slightly confusing”.

Nonetheless he accepted his client had not taken the bolts out of the guns as required.

Carr’s lawyer told the court the fireworks were bought by his cliet’s father and he had forgotten they were there.

The fireworks, he said, were bought by Carr’s father when it was still legal to do so in Queensland and stored in a jam jar.

Carr, he said, had owned the 4856ha property since 1960 and simply “forgot he had them”.

The loose ammunition dated back to the Second World War.

Carr’s lawyer told the court his client, who was a former chair of the Masonic Lodge and rural fire brigade member, was “embarrassed and remorseful” to have landed before the courts.

He said Carr’s son forced the 70-year-old to open the safe and that was why the weapons were not secured when police found them.

Mr Callaghan accepted Carr’s guilty plea to the charges, noting the safe had been secured until the incident with his son.

He placed Carr on a good behaviour bond for six months.

Originally published as Phillip Carr pleads guilty to firearm storage crimes