Jason Bond and the victim were in a relationship. As it broke down, the 42-year-old moved out of the victim’s house and took up residence “out bush” in a tent off Turpentine Road at Tomerong. 

Bond’s partner had visited this location with him to camp a number of times and while trying to salvage the relationship she took him “some roast lamb rolls with mustard and salted caramel brownies.” 

“I still liked him and wanted to see if he could come good,” she told Milton Local Court. 

“I felt there may have been some good left in him.”

When the victim arrived Bond was angered by her presence and questioned how she found him.

A verbal argument broke out between the pair that ended in Bond smashing “the side mirror off [the victim’s] car”.

Magistrate Gabriel Fleming made note the court had heard two “entirely different versions” of the same event and therefore it was impossible to be certain of the entire event. 

“It is clear there was an altercation about the food,” she said. 

“Nobody else was there and there are two opposing versions.”

Bond was charged with intentionally destroying property in a domestic violence related incident, placed on a 12-month good behaviour bond and ordered to pay $226.10 for the replacement of the mirror. 

When Magistrate Fleming asked Bond’s solicitor if he was in a position to pay a fine Brett Ford responded, “Your honour, you have just heard my client lives in the bush.”