A federal sentence cannot be ordered to be served 'cumulatively' upon a State sentence; s 19(1) of the Crimes Act 1914 (Cth) requires the court to fix a specific commencement date. Where the non-parole period on the State sentence has already expired, s 19(1)(b) has no application and the court is not obliged to set the earliest release date as the commencement date. A federal sentence cannot be backdated under s 16E/s 87 to a date when no time was spent in custody for the federal offences. The proper method to achieve cumulation is to set the commencement date at the expiry of the State sentence.
The full text is available to signed-in members, including the 7 later cases that cite this judgment.