Robbery Charges in Queensland
Property Offences — 2026-10-16 — by Sacha Sarah Smith, Civic Law
What turns stealing into robbery in Queensland, when robbery carries life, being charged when someone else took the property, bail, the District Court, sentencing and children.
A robbery charge can come out of very different events. A man takes cash from a till and pushes the shop assistant aside on his way out. A teenager tells another to hand over his phone or be hit. Someone waits in a car outside a service station while a friend goes in.
Robbery is stealing with force, or with a threat of force. The force or threat has to happen at the time of the stealing, or just before or just after it, and it has to be used to get the property or to keep it. That is what separates robbery from stealing, and it is why the penalties for robbery are so much higher. Robbery and attempted robbery are set out in sections 409 to 412 of the Criminal Code Act 1899 (Qld).
What Turns Stealing Into Robbery
Any force is enough. There is no minimum, and nobody has to be injured. A push or a shove can be enough.
A threat is enough on its own, even if nobody is touched. It must be a threat to use force against a person or against property. A threat does not have to be put into words. It can come from what you do, such as raising a fist. But a person being frightened is not enough if nothing you did amounted to force or a threat.
Timing and purpose matter. The force or threat has to come at the time of the stealing, or just before or just after it, and it has to be used to get the property, or to stop someone resisting or taking it back. A push in the doorway to get past the shop assistant who is trying to stop you leaving is part of the robbery. A fight that starts some time later, over something else, is not. In that situation it is stealing , not robbery, and the fight may lead to a separate charge of assault.
Robbery also needs a stealing. If you honestly believed the property was yours, or that you had a right to take it, the law says you are not criminally responsible for taking it, and so you are not guilty of robbery. An example is taking back a phone you believed was yours. Your belief does not have to be correct, or even reasonable, but it does have to be honest, and the court decides whether it was honest from all the evidence, including what you said and did at the time. This defence covers the taking only. If you pushed or hit someone to get the property, you can still be charged with assault.
When Robbery Carries a Maximum of Life
The maximum penalty is the highest sentence the law allows for an offence, and it is meant for the worst examples of that offence. It is not where a sentence starts. The court sets the sentence by looking at what you actually did, your part in it, your history and your circumstances.
For robbery the maximum is 14 years in prison. It rises to life in prison in three situations.
The first is where you had a weapon, or pretended to have one. Pretending is enough, so it does not matter that there was no real weapon.
The second is where you were with someone else who was taking part in the robbery and was there when it happened. The law calls this robbery "in company". The other person does not have to take anything or touch anyone.
The third is where you used force against a person. The force does not have to injure anyone. A push to get past someone is force against a person.
Because of that third situation, any robbery in which force was used against a person carries a maximum of life. The 14-year maximum applies only where none of the three situations is proved: there was no weapon, real or pretended, nobody else taking part was there, and no force was used on a person, as in a robbery carried out by a threat alone. The prosecution has to prove whichever of the three situations it alleges. If they cannot, the maximum is 14 years.
If nothing was taken, police may charge attempted robbery instead. It is a separate offence with lower maximum penalties than robbery, except where someone armed used the weapon on a person, which still carries life.
Being Charged When Someone Else Took the Property
You can be found guilty of robbery without taking anything or touching anyone, in two ways.
The first is helping. Under section 7 of the Criminal Code , a person who helps someone else commit an offence, and does it for the purpose of helping them commit it, is guilty of the offence too. That can include a driver who waits outside to get the others away, or someone who keeps watch. Being there is not enough on its own. Nor is giving help without knowing what it was for. A friend who gave someone a lift, not knowing they meant to rob the service station, is not guilty of robbery for giving that lift.
The second is a shared plan. Under section 8, if two or more people agree to do something unlawful together, such as stealing from a shop, and while they are carrying out that plan one of them commits another offence that was a probable result of the plan, each of them is guilty of that offence. The High Court has said that a probable result is something that could well happen. A remote possibility is not enough, but it does not have to be more likely than not. Whether it was a probable result is decided on the evidence by the jury, or by the judge if there is no jury.
A 2010 case in the Queensland Court of Appeal shows how this works. Three men went into a newsagency in Brisbane. Two of them asked the shop assistant about a magazine, and she walked away from the till to show them where it was. While she was away, the third man took money from the till. She saw him and went towards him. She was standing between him and the door, and he pushed her out of the way and ran out with the money.
One of the two men who had asked about the magazine was charged with robbery with force against a person, the form of robbery that carries a maximum of life. He had not touched the money or the shop assistant. The prosecution said the three men had planned to steal from the till, and that the push was a probable result of carrying out that plan. His defence was that he was in the shop innocently and had nothing to do with the man at the till. The jury watched the security footage and found him guilty.
He appealed, arguing among other things that the push was an assault that came after the stealing, not part of a robbery. The Court of Appeal disagreed. The push came moments after the money was taken and was used to get away with it, so it was robbery, and because it was force against a person it was the more serious form. His conviction stood. The appeal was only about whether he was guilty, so the judgment does not say what sentence he received.
Whether you were part of a plan depends on the evidence about you, such as security footage, messages, and what you did before and after. If you are found guilty, your part still matters when you are sentenced, because the court must consider how much you were to blame.
Getting Bail on a Robbery Charge
A robbery charge does not on its own mean you will be kept in custody. For an adult, bail is decided under the Bail Act 1980 (Qld). Ordinarily, it is for the prosecution to show the court that you are an unacceptable risk if released: that you would not come back to court, would commit an offence, would endanger someone, or would interfere with witnesses. If the prosecution cannot show that, the court must grant bail.
Two situations that can arise in robbery cases reverse that starting point. The court must then refuse bail unless you show why you should not be kept in custody. This is called showing cause .
The first is where you are accused of using, or threatening to use, a gun, another weapon or an explosive during the robbery.
The second is where, at the time of the robbery, you were already charged with another indictable offence that had not yet been dealt with, whether or not you were on bail for it. "Indictable" is a legal category that includes many everyday charges, not only the most serious ones. Stealing, including shoplifting, is an indictable offence under the Criminal Code . So it matters what else you were facing when the robbery is said to have happened, even if that other charge seems minor.
A child's bail is decided under the Youth Justice Act 1992 (Qld), which has its own rules.
Robbery Cases Go to the District Court
For an adult, a robbery charge cannot be finished in the Magistrates Court . It starts there, and the magistrate deals with bail and the early court dates while the prosecution prepares its evidence. The case is then sent on to the District Court , in a step called committal. In the District Court you either plead guilty and are sentenced by a judge, or plead not guilty and have a trial before a judge and jury.
The prosecution can decide to replace a robbery charge with other charges, such as stealing and assault, for example where the evidence does not show that force was used to get or keep the property. Charges of stealing and common assault are ordinarily finished in the Magistrates Court. Whether to change the charge is the prosecution's decision, but your lawyer can ask them to.
Sentencing for Robbery
There is no minimum sentence for robbery, and jail is not automatic. The sentence is decided under the Penalties and Sentences Act 1992 (Qld).
For most offences, the court must treat jail as a last resort and prefer a sentence that lets you stay in the community. That rule does not apply where the offence involved violence against another person, or someone was physically hurt. A robbery in which force was used on a person falls into that group, even where the force was a push. The court must then look first at things such as the risk to the community if you are not jailed, what happened, how much violence was used, the circumstances of the person robbed and any injury or loss, your criminal history, your age and character, and whether you have shown remorse.
The court must also consider how much you were to blame for the robbery, so someone who kept watch can be in a different position from the person who used the force.
A guilty plea must be taken into account, and the court can reduce the sentence because of it. How much can depend on how early you pleaded guilty, or told the prosecution you would.
When the Person Charged Is a Child
A child charged with robbery is dealt with under the Youth Justice Act 1992 (Qld), not the adult law. The case starts before a magistrate in the Childrens Court . Because robbery is treated as a serious offence, it then goes, through committal, to a judge of the Childrens Court of Queensland, who deals with a guilty plea or a trial.
The longest period of detention the judge can order depends on when the robbery happened. For a robbery committed from 13 December 2024, robbery is on a list of offences to which adult penalties apply. That does not mean the child is sentenced as an adult. The child is still sentenced in the Childrens Court of Queensland under the Youth Justice Act , and the judge can still make orders other than detention, such as probation. What changed is the longest detention the judge can order. It is now the same as the longest jail term an adult could receive: 14 years, or life in the three situations described above.
For a robbery committed before 13 December 2024, the earlier limits apply. A judge could order detention of up to 7 years for robbery, or up to 10 years where the robbery was one that carries life for an adult. Detention for longer than 10 years was possible only if the robbery involved violence against a person and the judge considered it particularly heinous.
Attempted robbery has been added to the same list since then. For an attempt, the date of the offence decides which limits apply.
Civic Law acts for adults and children charged with robbery and attempted robbery in Cairns and across Far North Queensland.
Robbery — Magistrates Court Stage
District Court Plea