A PENSHURST man has been sentenced to nine months in jail for his involvement in a ram raid that cause almost $200,000 worth of damage to a Warrnambool shopping centre.

Levi Tihi, 25, was sentenced to nine-months imprisonment in the County Court on Thursday after pleading guilty to burglary, property damage, drug possession and disqualified driving.

Judge Gavan Meredith also imposed a two-year community corrections order, which included supervision, drug testing, drug and alcohol treatment programs and a road trauma awareness course.

Judge Meredith said the ram raid, which saw Tihi and Hamilton man, Tyrone Brown, 32, drive a black Ford Ranger ute through the Gateway Plaza shopping centre was “drug fuelled madness”.

The pair had been at a social gathering in Dunkeld on March 28 where they were drinking and consuming drugs, before deciding about 11pm to drive to Warrnambool in Brown’s brother’s ute.

Judge Meredith said when Tihi and Brown arrived in Warrnambool, they pulled over and took the number plates off the vehicle. About 50 minutes later, the pair rammed the vehicle through automatic glass sliding doors at the western entrance of the shopping centre.

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