In a recent case, a 41 year old heroin addict robbed three women at knife-point in Melbourne’s west following which he was sentenced to seven and a half years in jail.

The addict, Bruce Croft, from Melton South, pleaded guilty to a raft of crimes including armed robbery and false imprisonment. He threatened three women with a knife over a period of three days, under heroin addiction, in a desperate bid to get some money for his next hit.

Carly Beckwith, one of the victims, was attacked when she was packing groceries into her car outside a Melton supermarket. Croft was covering his face with a balaclava when he jumped into her car while her 3 years old daughter was in the back seat.

He threatened her to give him money and then drive to her house where her partner gave him $250.

His next attempt was to forcibly snatch money from a woman at an ATM. She first put a fight before he pointed a knife at her seeing which she handed him over the cash.

Lastly on the third day after exhausting the earlier money he approached a third woman forcing her to drive to a petrol station to get money.