Two youths accused of plotting a Columbine-style mass shooting against staff and students at their high school have walked free from court.
The pair, who cannot be named, had been in detention since their arrest in November 2017 over allegations they were plotting a massacre at their school in South Australia’s Riverland region using homemade weapons and body armour.
The 18 and 20-year-old were due to stand trial accused of conspiring to murder but in February pleaded guilty to the downgraded charge of aggravated threatening of life after prosecutors conceded they never intended to carry out the shooting.
At the Supreme Court on Thursday, the relieved pair smiled at their families from the dock as Justice Kevin Nicholson imposed suspended six-month jail sentences on them both, along with three-year good behaviour bonds.
One of the men, 20, made no comment as he enjoyed his first few minutes of freedom leaving the Supreme Court on Thursday
Photos of the weapons arsenal (pictured) were shown in court last month ahead of sentencing
Strict conditions were imposed on the pair, including drug and alcohol monitoring.
The judge said the youths, who were 16 and 18 at the time of their offending, had wanted to create a fear that their plan would likely be carried out.
However, he said he accepted they never intended to commit murder or proceed with the ‘expressed plan’.
‘A clear message must be sent to young people in the community that this sort of behaviour is totally unacceptable,’ Justice Nicholson said.
‘Your plan was to frighten, to terrify and to present yourself to your school associates and perhaps the wider community as school shooters who meant business.’
‘I’m satisfied that once you started to conceive of your plan, you jointly contributed to the creation of that plan — albeit, as it turned out to be, a fantasy.’
The 20-year-old (pictured) and 18-year-old had been in custody since their arrests in 2017
The judge said the pair had been in detention ‘long enough’.
He acknowledged the 20-year-old had ‘expressed remorse, guilt and empathy’ while the 18-year-old had written a letter of apology and become ‘a role model’ in youth detention, The Adelaide Advertiser reported.
‘Your time in custody has been very difficult … I expect it has gone a long way to teaching each of you an enduring lesson,’ Justice Nicholson said.
Flanked by their families and lawyers, the pair made no comment to the waiting media as they left court.
Prosecutors had previously argued in court the men were obsessed with school shootings in the US, including the 1999 Columbine High School shooting.
The threats left the Riverland community ‘shocked and terrified’ at the time.
‘You tapped into the fear that a community might experience an appalling mass-shooting of the type that has become all too common in the US,’ Justice Nicholson told the pair.
A body armour made from the steel netting of a shopping trolley (pictured) was found in the shed of one of the men’s sheds
‘This is not a case in which an offender placed in fear a single individual — a significant section of the community was put in fear.’
Earlier this month, the court released photos taken by police of the arsenal of weapons found in the younger man’s shed.
They included more than a dozen knives, a makeshift machete, homemade napalm and a suit of body armour fashioned from the steel netting of a shopping trolley with a metal block welded to it.
A lawyer for the aspiring blacksmith told the court last month that his client was not a killer but a businessman who enjoyed making weapons and helmets as a hobby.
The napalm was for forging steel not committing mass murder, the lawyer had argued.
The weapons arsenal uncovered also included more than a dozen knives (pictured)