ONTARIO COMPUTER THIEF PLEADS GUILTY Man, 21, pleads guilty to a slew of charges - The Whig Standard - Ontario, CA:

Man, 21, pleads guilty to a slew of charges
Posted By SUE YANAGISAWA
Posted 2 hours ago


A Kingston man, already on probation for a fraud conviction in November 2007, has been sentenced to eight months in jail and another 12 months of probation for a subsequent series of crimes.

John Cammalleri, 21, was given double credit for 30 days of presentence custody when he entered his pleas, however, and is consequently deemed to be serving the equivalent of a 10- month sentence.

Cammalleri pleaded guilty in Kingston's Ontario Court of Justice to violating a condition of his probation barring him from having or consuming alcohol and other intoxicants; two separate thefts of laptop computers from buildings on the Queen's University campus; assault causing bodily harm to another man; and a simultaneous violation of the curfew imposed as part of his bail following the thefts.

Assistant Crown attorney Elisabeth Foxton disclosed that Cammalleri had been placed on probation for 18 months in late November 2007.

She told Justice Rommel Masse that his initial probation breach was discovered on April 5 by Kingston Police patrolling the north end shortly before 1 a. m. Officers were looking for a group of young men who had been reported to be breaking into parked motor vehicles off Guthrie Drive when they spotted Cammalleri and two companions walking on Joyce Street at Sheppard Street.

Foxton said one of the men fled at the approach of the cruiser but Cammalleri and his other companion remained and spoke to the officers. Unfortunately for him, it was obvious he'd been drinking and when his name was checked the officers discovered his probation, which still had about two months remaining, required him to abstain from alcohol and he was arrested.

He was subsequently released, however, and 11 days later, on April 16, turned up on Queen's campus. Foxton said he was captured on video in Stauffer Library at the same time one of the university's students had her laptop stolen. Masse was told the student had left her computer unattended on one of the desks while she went to the washroom and when she returned it was gone.

Later the same day, Foxton said Cammalleri got into the Policy Studies building directly across the street from the library.

Two female students had been using one of the offices there to study, according to the Crown, but had decided to take a break around 5 p. m., just about the time Cammalleri was shopping the corridors. She told Masse one of the women had left her laptop unattended in the office and the other had left her purse there.

Cammalleri discovered them. The prosecutor told the judge he scooped up the laptop, fished the other student's wallet out of her purse and left building. Masse was told he went into the nearby John Deutsch Centre, where he removed the cash from thestolen wallet and discarded the wallet and the case that went with the laptop.

Foxton told the judge he was caught on video tape and immediately recognized by police when they subsequently watched it.

A couple of weeks later, when Cammalleri arrived at Kingston Police headquarters to check in, Masse was told he was confronted about the campus thefts and he agreed to recover the stolen laptops, a promise he subsequently kept. However, one of them came back with a scratched screen, Foxton said. She told the judge that Cammalleri maintained the scratches were already there when he stole the computer, but his victim disagreed and both victims insisted the theft charges stand.

He was once more released on bail, but Foxton said he turned up again when police investigating an assault in front of Burger King again saw him on video surveillance footage, this time from the restaurant.

Masse heard that the victim of the assault had been standing in front of Burger King with some friends around 3 a. m. on June 5 when his assailant approached and began berating him, then head butted him, breaking the man's nose and opening a cut that required four stitches to close.

When police obtained the tapes, Foxton said they again had no trouble identifying the assailant that night as Cammalleri, who at the time was subject to a 10 p. m. curfew.

She told the judge that officers drove to his home to pick him up and he admitted to delivering the head butt, but claimed the victim had taken a swing at him -- an event Foxton said the video doesn't show.

She also told Masse that the officers offered Cammalleri an opportunity to change before they took him to the station, since he'd answered his door in a muscle shirt.

While they waited for him, Foxton said Cammalleri took the opportunity to flee out an upstairs window. He didn't abscond for long, however. She told the judge he turned himself in later the same day.

Cammalleri's defence lawyer, Brian Callender, urged the sentence of 10 months, less pretrial custody for his client.

He argued that while Cammalleri is accumulating an unenviable record at a young age, his mother would tell the court "he's not such a bad kid."

Callender contended that his client actually committed the assault not because he'd been threatened, as he'd earlier suggested, but because he'd witnessed the other man "doing something he disagreed with, striking a young girl." That was something he found "abhorrent," Callender suggested.

Additionally, "the police probably would not have been able to resolve this without my client's help," he argued, suggesting that the video surveillance footage from Queen's campus only proved Cammalleri was there. He said it was inconclusive as far as proving he'dstolen anything.

Foxton requested a 12-month sentence. She conceded that his help was instrumental in securing the return of the the stolen laptops, but she urged Masse to "send a message" with regard to the assault. The severity of the injuries, she said, demanded it.

Masse, in handing down his sentence, concentrated most of his remarks on the thefts, although the assault accounted for the bulk of his sentence.

Students need their laptops, he told Cammalleri, and given the timing of the theft, around exam time, he could have cost his victims their school year.

"Mr. Cammalleri," the judge said, "you're starting to put together a record that is starting to get longer and longer. It must stop."

He ordered the 21-year-old, once he's released from jail, to abstain from alcohol, drugs and other intoxicants and banned him from bars, inns, taverns and other places that sell or dispense alcohol. He's allowed to enter a licensed family-oriented restaurant between noon and 2 p. m. or 6 and 8 p. m., but only for the purpose of eating a meal.

Article ID# 1653022