A YOUNG man with an addiction to prescription medication has pleaded guilty to using a knife to hold up stores at Bennetts Green and Redhead, including one armed robbery he told police he could not remember committing.
Decklen Deaves-Thornton, 18, of Windale, appeared in Newcastle Local Court via audio visual link from John Morony Correctional Centre on Wednesday where he pleaded guilty to three counts of armed robbery.
He will next appear in court next month to get a sentence date. Deaves-Thornton handed himself into police in April and confessed to using a large knife to commit an armed robbery at a service station at Bennetts Green a few days earlier. He was "extremely remorseful", police said, after he "became aware that he was responsible" and because he had no prior criminal record and had handed himself in police granted him conditional bail.
The next day he was arrested at home and charged with another armed robbery at a convenience store at Redhead, a strikingly similar hold-up that he later told police he did not remember.
