Using a Carriage Service to Menace

Our expert criminal lawyers for using a carriage service to menace offences can help you:

• Obtain bail.
• Be found not guilty.
• Receive a lenient sentence, like no conviction and no prison.

You will be represented by a team of award-winning criminal lawyers, with 500+ five-star Google reviews, who offer fixed fees and free first consultations.

You can read our reviews here.

Using a Carriage Service to Menace

This charge of using a carriage service to menace is popular with police. It captures a wide range of behaviour from threats made in a domestic violence context to calls between aggrieved parties in business and former friends. Increasingly posts on social media are being captured by this offence. 

Fortunately, our criminal lawyers often can put the police to task in proving the offence of stalk/intimidate. Our clients are frequently found not guilty of stalk/intimidate. 

If you intend to plead guilty, our criminal lawyers have a proven track record of not only keeping our clients out of jail but also in some cases having no conviction recorded.

Pleading not guilty 

You will be found not guilty of the offence of Using a carriage service to menace if the police cannot prove beyond reasonable doubt:

1. You (or someone on your behalf) used a carriage service; and
2. You did so in a way (whether by the method of use or the content of a communication, or both) that a reasonable person would regard as being, in all the circumstances, menacing, harassing or offensive.

Harass typically means to trouble or annoy by a repeated course of conduct. A single telephone call may also be harassment, depending on the words uttered or the time and circumstances in which the call was made – or even if words were not uttered.

Menace means to cause a normally courageous person to feel apprehensive for their safety because of the call or calls. It isn’t necessary for a call to threaten actual harm for it to be menacing. Nor is it necessary for the communication to be made directly to the person menaced. As long as the caller intends the communication to reach the ultimate recipient, it is sufficient.

In determining whether the language used is offensive, the relevant question is whether an ordinary, reasonable person would have been offended by the conduct.

You can read more information about pleading not guilty here.

Common defences include: 

• A reasonable person would not consider it menacing, harassing or offensive.
• You did not do the alleged acts. 
• You did not use a carriage service. 

Pleading guilty

If you plead guilty to using a Carriage Service to Menace, we want to achieve the best possible result for you. We often negotiate with prosecutors to have you plead guilty to less serious facts or to a less serious charge, so you get a lighter sentence.

Using a carriage service to menace carries a maximum penalty of two years imprisonment in the Local Court and three years imprisonment in the District Court.  

You can read about all the sentencing options that a court has, including having no conviction recorded.

You can read more about pleading guilty here.

Do I need references?

We believe references are an extremely important part of a plea of guilty in court. Read about court processes and how to write a good character reference.

Contact Australian Criminal Law Group

Our criminal lawyers, with 500+ five-star Google reviews, can beat a charge of using a Carriage Service to Menace or obtain a lenient sentence for you if you plead guilty.

Call us on (02) 8815 8167 for your free first conference or submit a website enquiry.