By Victoria Stone-Meadows
A CRANBOURNE man faces charges over more than 200 offences after a crime spree throughout the south-east suburbs of Melbourne.
The 24-year-old man clocked up the extraordinary number of criminal offences in just a few months.
He is facing charges at the Dandenong Magistrates’ Court that range from burglary, and traffic offences to drug related and reckless conduct charges.
The accused was a person of interest across three different police service areas for roughly four months and has been implicated in over 80 burglaries or attempted burglaries.
He has been charged by a number of police officers in the Casey, Greater Dandenong and Frankston police service areas.
He was arrested and taken into police custody after detectives from the Greater Dandenong Crime Investigation Unit executed a warrant on an address in Stawell Street in Cranbourne on the morning of Wednesday 9 November.
Arresting Detective Senior Constable Christine Johnstone said the accused was found with many items, believed to be proceeds of crime, but would not give details of what those items were.
“A search warrant was executed at this address and a large number of items were seized,” she said.
A 39-year-old female and a 36-year-old male were also arrested at the property as a result of the search warrant.
Detective Senior Constable Brad Coller from Casey Crime Investigation Unit has pinned the accused with 90 charges across several suburbs including Cranbourne, Narre Warren and Pakenham.
He said he hoped justice would be done quickly but the sheer volume of charges meant the case might be in court for a while.
“I’m hoping but I doubt it will be dealt with swiftly,” he said.
However, Det Sen Const Coller said the police officers across Frankston, Casey and Greater Dandenong were confident their charges would stick.
“(His) defence may not agree with a majority of the charges, but we’ve got a strong case on all our accounts and that is why we charged him.”
He first appeared at the Dandenong Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday 30 November but his matter was adjourned, and he has been remanded in custody until Tuesday 20 December.
