A worker who had a knife pointed at her while a man demanded that she open a cash register and give him money has told a court how the incident “destroyed my life”.
The woman had been working in the bar at Mooroopna Golf Club on January 6 when Steven Andrew Dates came in waving a knife and shouting at the woman to “open the draw … give me the money”.
Dates, 31, who is from NSW but was living in Shepparton at the time, pleaded guilty in the Shepparton County Koori Court to armed robbery.
The court heard how Dates was armed with a knife when he went to the golf club at 10.25pm and demanded money.
A duty manager at the club opened the till and gave Dates the $2600 that was inside.
The court heard Dates also pointed the knife at another woman in the club as she called 000, telling her “I wouldn’t do that”.
Dates left the club in a silver sedan and the knife was found abandoned in the front yard of a house in Fairway Dve.
Eight days later police found the car in the driveway of a house in Northumberland Cres in Shepparton, with Dates’ fingerprints on the driver’s side door handle.
They also found a hoodie and a backpack matching those in the CCTV footage from the golf club at a St George’s Rd house.
In a victim impact statement read to the court by the prosecutor, the woman working in the bar at the time told how she was still scared to walk into the gaming room at the club where the incident occurred.
She also spoke of how she no longer feels safe at work and had a panic attack during her first shift back after the incident.
The woman said she was “fearful for my life” that day and now needed to sit with her back to the wall whenever she went out so no-one could approach her from behind.
“His actions have destroyed my life,” she said.
“I need to know he won’t do something like this again.”
The man who was working at the club that night told how he was “hyper vigilant” at work now and how the crime had left him feeling “shaken up”
He also said it “brought back memories of another robbery I was victim of 20 years ago”.
The court was then closed as Dates took part in a sentencing conversation with Aboriginal elders.
The plea hearing will continue on another date.