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District Court 1 May 2026

R v Zreika

[2026] NSWDC 120

Fraud & dishonestyPublic order & justice offences

Citation: R v Zreika [2026] NSWDC 120
Court: District Court of New South Wales
Date: 1 May 2026
Judge(s): Newlinds SC DCJ

Background

The offender was found guilty by a jury of a single charge of demanding money with menaces with intent to steal, contrary to s 99(1) of the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW). The charge carried a maximum penalty of 10 years' imprisonment.

The offence arose from a joint criminal enterprise in which the offender, together with at least two co-offenders (Mr El Masri and Mr Homsi) and possibly others, demanded $150,000 from the offender's cousin (the victim) through threats of violence. Over several weeks in August and September 2023, threatening phone calls, text messages, and photographs of the victim's home were sent to the victim's mobile phone. The campaign culminated in Mr Homsi and Mr El Masri attending the victim's residence to make threats.

The central issue at trial had been whether the Crown proved beyond reasonable doubt that the offender was part of the joint criminal enterprise. The jury's guilty verdict confirmed he was. At sentencing, a critical dispute emerged over the offender's level of involvement: the Crown contended he was the instigator and "boss" of the scheme, while the offender submitted he was no more than a participant who provided information to the others.

  • What findings of fact should the sentencing judge make regarding the offender's role in the joint criminal enterprise, including whether he was the instigator or "boss"?
  • What was the objective seriousness of the offender's conduct, assessed against the range of conduct captured by s 99(1)?
  • What weight should be given to subjective factors including remorse, prospects of rehabilitation, prior criminal history, and hardship to the offender's family?
  • How should the parity principle apply where co-offenders had been sentenced on different (and apparently more lenient) bases, and on agreed facts that may not have reflected their true culpability?

Decision

Findings of fact on role: Newlinds SC DCJ rejected the Crown's submission that the offender was the "boss" or instigator of the criminal enterprise. His Honour found Mr Homsi to be neither an honest nor reliable witness and gave no weight to his assertions that the offender drew him into the criminal conduct. The judge accepted that the offender was involved in the joint criminal enterprise by providing the victim's identity, contact details, residential address, and photographs of the victim's home to the co-offenders. His Honour found it probable the offender gave some instructions to the others but was not satisfied of this beyond reasonable doubt. The offender's involvement in making direct threats was slightly less than the co-offenders, as he made no direct threats to the victim himself.

Objective seriousness: The court found the overall criminal conduct of the enterprise was serious: credible threats were made against the victim, his wife, and his children, in an effort to extort a very large sum of money. The fact that the offender targeted his own cousin was described as "disgraceful." However, given the finding that the offender's role could not be established as greater than that of Mr El Masri or Mr Homsi, his Honour assessed the objective seriousness of the offender's involvement as somewhat below the middle of a notional range for this type of offence.

Subjective case: The offender's prior criminal record (drug-related offences ending in 2012) disentitled him to some leniency, but the judge regarded its relevance as slight given over a decade of non-offending and the different nature of the prior offences. The court noted the absence of any direct subjective material from the offender himself, which made it difficult to assess remorse, insight, and likelihood of reoffending. A letter from the offender's wife and statements in the Sentencing Assessment Report painted a positive picture of the offender as a family man who acted out of character.

Parity: The parity principle was a significant issue. The co-offenders had been sentenced on agreed facts and in circumstances that resulted in very lenient outcomes. His Honour noted that one co-offender's lenient sentence could be explained, while the other's could not. The court considered the applicable principles from Lowe v The Queen, Green v The Queen; Quinn v The Queen, and other authorities regarding how parity applies where co-offenders were sentenced on different facts and circumstances.

Orders Made

  • The full text of the judgment was truncated, so the precise sentence imposed is not available from the material provided. The court's reasoning indicated that the offender would be sentenced on the basis that his involvement was not greater than that of Mr El Masri or Mr Homsi, with objective seriousness assessed as somewhat below the mid-range.

Key Takeaways

  • The District Court declined to sentence the offender as the instigator or "boss" of the joint criminal enterprise, finding that the Crown had not proved that characterisation beyond reasonable doubt and that the police investigation could have been more thorough in examining the involvement of other participants.
  • Where a co-offender gives evidence at trial and is found to be neither honest nor reliable (particularly where that witness had his own reasons to deflect culpability), a sentencing judge may give no weight to that witness's claims about the roles of others.
  • The parity principle was engaged even where co-offenders had been sentenced on different agreed facts, with the Court recognising that an inexplicably lenient sentence imposed on one co-offender created a potential basis for moderating the offender's sentence.
  • No direct subjective material from the offender (as opposed to material from family members and pre-sentence reports) was before the Court, a factor that made it difficult to assess remorse, insight, and prospects of rehabilitation.
  • A criminal history that was over a decade old and involved different types of offending was treated as having only slight relevance to the sentencing exercise, though it disentitled the offender from claiming the mitigating factor of being a first offender.

Legislation and Cases Referenced

Legislation:
- Crimes Act 1900 (NSW), s 99(1)
- Crimes (Sentencing Procedure) Act 1999 (NSW), s 3A, s 21A(2)(c), s 21A(2)(n)

Cases:
- Ali v R [2014] NSWCCA 45
- Green v The Queen; Quinn v The Queen [2011] HCA 49
- Jimmy v The Queen (2010) 77 NSWLR 540
- Lowe v The Queen (1984) 154 CLR 606
- R v Armstrong [2001] NSWCCA 77
- R v Diamond (Court of Criminal Appeal, 18 February 1993, unreported)
- R v Ismunandar [2002] NSWCCA 477; (2002) 136 A Crim R 206
- R v M.A.K., R v M.S.K. [2006] NSWCCA 381
- R v Rexhaj (Court of Criminal Appeal, 29 February 1996, unreported)