Director of Public Prosecutions v Latimer
[2017] VCC 87
•14 February 2017
| IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA AT MELBOURNE CRIMINAL DIVISION | Revised Not Restricted Suitable for Publication |
Case No. CR-16-02192
| DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS |
| v |
| COLIN JOHN LATIMER |
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JUDGE: | Her Honour Judge Sexton | |
WHERE HELD: | Melbourne | |
DATE OF HEARING: | 8 February 2017 | |
DATE OF SENTENCE: | 14 February 2017 | |
CASE MAY BE CITED AS: | DPP v Latimer | |
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION: | [2017] VCC 87 | |
REASONS FOR SENTENCE
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Subject: Criminal Law – Sexual Offences
Catchwords: Sexual penetration of a child between 10 – 16 years - indecent assault – sexual offences committed in 1984 – 1985
Legislation Cited: Judicial Proceedings Reports Act 1958, Jury Directions Act 2015
Cases Cited:R v Clarkson (2011) 32 VR 361, Adamson v R [2015] VSCA 194, R v AWF [2000] VSCA 172, GEM v R [2010] VSCA 168, Bourne v R [2011] VSCA 159, DPP v CDP [2009] VSCA 114, DPP v Toomey [2009] VSCA 90, DPP v Dalgliesh [2016] VSCA 148, DPP v OJA (2007) 172 A Crim R 182, R v AB (No.2) (2008) 18 VR 291, Bauer (a pseudonym) v R [2015] VSCA 55, HMcL v R (2000) 174 ALR 1, Gordon v The Queen [2013] VSCA 343
Sentence: TES 3 years’ 4 months imprisonment with minimum of 20 months, sentenced as a serious sex offender, registered sex offender with a lifetime reporting period and with consent order that a forensic sample is taken.
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APPEARANCES: | Counsel | Solicitors |
| For the DPP | Ms J. Malobabic for plea Mr N. Donaghy for sentence | OPP |
| For the Accused | Ms R. Sleeth for plea Ms N. Barba for sentence | VLA |
HER HONOUR:
1 At the outset, I advise that I am using a pseudonym for the name of the complainant in these reasons to protect his privacy. I remind those listening to these remarks that the law prohibits the publication of any details likely to lead to the identification of a sexual offences complainant[1]. The complainant will be called Dennis Johnson.
[1] Section 4 Judicial Proceedings Reports Act
2 Colin Latimer, you have pleaded guilty to three charges of sexual penetration against a child aged between 10 and 16 years, which had a maximum sentence of ten years’ imprisonment; and to three charges of indecently assaulting a child under 16 years, which had a maximum sentence of 5 years’ imprisonment. These penalties were applicable at the time of the offending.
3 I sentence you on the basis of the prosecution opening read out in court[2], which is an agreed summary. In brief, in the 1980’s, your parents were friendly with the parents of the complainant, Dennis Johnson, and through this association, you had contact with the complainant who is 6 years younger than you.
[2] Exhibit A
4 In January 1984, you arrived unannounced at the Johnson’s home from interstate and stayed for about 4 days. While you had gifts for Mrs Johnson, you gave better gifts to Dennis. At that time, you were aged 17 years and Dennis was aged 11. On the first day you were there, you performed sexual acts on Dennis, by kissing and cuddling him and then putting his penis in your mouth. You masturbated him and then resumed the oral penetration. This penetration is the subject of charge 1, a composite charge made up of those two penetrations. You told Dennis that he was your ‘special little man’, and that you both had to keep it secret as, ‘no one would understand [your] love’.
5 The night before you returned home, you woke Dennis during the night and again masturbated him before putting his penis in your mouth. That is the subject of Charge 2. You also instructed him how to kiss in a sexual way, and told him you loved him.
6 You continued contact with Dennis after you returned interstate by writing him letters approximately monthly for about 18 months. You professed your love for him, and sent him an expensive pen.
7 You came to Victoria again in September 1985, and again stayed with the Johnson family. You were then aged 19 years and Dennis was aged 13 years. You gave gifts to all the Johnson family, with Dennis receiving toys, lollies and money. You later became angry when Dennis did not show you affection.
8 On the first night you were there, you went to Dennis’s bedroom and woke him by masturbating him. Dennis questioned what you were doing and while you tried to convince him that you were ‘in love’, you did say that you would stop if he wanted to. When he said he did want to stop, you became angry again, saying that Dennis owed you for all the gifts you had given him, and you then threatened his family if he told anyone, or did not do what you wanted.
9 Faced with this, Dennis felt he had no choice, and you proceeded to masturbate him again and put his penis in your mouth. When he ejaculated, you again put his penis in your mouth to “clean him up” as you described it. After some other sexual activity, you ordered Dennis to do the same for you, putting your penis in his mouth. He felt sick and whenever he tried to stop, you made him continue, until you ejaculated into his mouth. These three penetrations are the subject of composite Charge 3. The aggravating features of this charge are that you ejaculated into his mouth, and that you persisted in penetrating him even when he made it clear that he wanted to stop.
10 The next day you picked Dennis up from school and while in the car, you demanded that Dennis pull down his pants so that you could masturbate him. Dennis complied in the face of threats you made. This is Charge 4.
11 On one of the nights you were visiting, a cousin of Dennis’ came to stay the night. Dennis arranged for you all to sleep in the lounge room in an attempt to prevent you from abusing him, but you still did. Dennis woke in the night to find you masturbating him, and he got up and locked himself in the toilet after you followed him there. This is Charge 5. It is an aggravating feature of this offence that it was committed in the presence of another person, who it appears was aware that something occurred between you and Dennis, and that Dennis left the room crying.
12 The following night, you came into Dennis’ room again and after masturbating him again, you penetrated his anus with your finger. You did the same act the next night. Charge 6 is a representative charge of these two acts of anal penetration on separate nights, which at the time you committed the offences, was considered by the law as an indecent assault. Penetration is the most serious form of indecent assault.
13 The offending stopped when you arrived unannounced at the Johnson home in 1986 or 1987, (although I note that there had been no offending since 1985), and Mrs Johnson, who had by then discovered and destroyed your letters to Dennis, confronted you and told you not to have any more contact with the family. Undeterred, you drove to where Dennis was working at a service station and told him you loved him and wanted him to live with you interstate. You drove off when Dennis threatened to douse you with petrol and set you alight.
14 All of the offending occurred in the context of you either making threats to Dennis, or grooming him by giving him gifts, and manipulating him by your barrage of love letters, the ongoing references to the two of you being ‘in love’, and by telling him he owed you for all the gifts.
15 Any sexual offending against a child is serious. In your case, this is made even more serious by the breach of trust of Dennis and his family when you perpetrated these acts on him while in their home as a guest, in a place where he should have been safe.
16 In order to pass a just sentence, I must assess the seriousness of your offending by considering the nature and extent of the offending conduct, its frequency and duration and the circumstances in which it occurred. I have already gone through the details.
17 Although the charges relate to two periods of time only, the offending was persistent during the times that you had access to Dennis for your sexual gratification. Further, you created the opportunities for abuse by travelling interstate to stay in the home of your intended victim and to have the possibility of unlimited access to him during those times.
18 I received a statement from Dennis as to the impact your crimes have had on him[3]. These are matters which I very much take into account in deciding the appropriate sentence. As Dennis did not want the statement read out in court, I will not refer specifically to his words. But I want you to realise that when it comes to children, it is presumed that they suffer harm from a sexual offence being committed against them, harm which can be long-term and serious and both physical and psychological[4], and which includes future harm[5]. All of these aspects apply to Dennis.
[3] Exhibit B
[4]R v Clarkson (2011) 32 VR 361, 368 [26], 371 [33]
[5]Adamson v R [2015] VSCA 194 at [56]
19 I have some things to say to Dennis, who was in court at the plea hearing. Nothing that I say can give him back his childhood, or his life. I know he is struggling with the effects of this serious abuse and that this struggle continues. All I can do is impose a sentence in accordance with the law, that recognises the impact on him, denounces the sexual abuse perpetrated on him and provides what the law demands as just punishment. Taking into account things that are in the offender’s favour is part of the sentencing exercise that the law requires me to undertake. From my experience as a Judge, I am aware that speaking about these things that he kept to himself for so long is very, very hard. But I acknowledge his bravery and spirit for coming forward and seeing this process through. I know that he does not see his future in bright terms and he does not know where he goes from here. But at least let me say that I do wish him well for the future with this case behind him after today.
20 Returning to you Mr Latimer, I will now turn to the matters that the law requires that I take into account.
21 The first of these matters is the fact that you pleaded guilty and you did so at the earliest opportunity. I accept that this shows that you accepted responsibility for your offending, and demonstrates a level of remorse for the impact of what you did on Dennis. Your plea of guilty has not only saved the community the time and cost of a trial, but it has saved Dennis from the ordeal of giving evidence. As a result of your plea of guilty, the sentence I will impose is less than would have been imposed had you been found guilty by a jury after a trial.
22
Next, I take into account that when you committed the offending in the first two charges, you apparently had not offended before. That means that for Charges 1 and 2 you are to be sentenced as a person who was of good character until you began committing those offences. Further, although you are 6 years older than Dennis, you were still a child under the law, as you were aged 17 during the offending in January 1984. That means that my sentences for those two charges must reflect the fact that had you been dealt with by a court then, it would have been in the Children’s Court, which has a sentencing regime with
a primary focus of rehabilitation and which is different to the sentencing regime for adults. Further, I take into account the remaining Charges, 3 - 6, were committed when you were of an age where the principle of rehabilitation is generally considered the most important purpose of sentencing, and, subject to your later offending being known at the time of sentence, rehabilitation would have been the focus, had you been dealt with back then.
23 Next, I take into account that you are being dealt with about 33 years after the first two offences. Where the evidence is that you told Dennis that he could not tell anyone about the sexual activity, delay up to the time of report to the police is not a matter that I take into account in your favour. The law recognises it is a common occurrence for victims of sexual offending, especially children, to find it difficult to report, and some never do.[6] So that passage of time cannot significantly mitigate against your crimes, because you contributed to his inability to complain about it by telling him that he could not tell anyone.
[6] Section 52 Jury Directions Act 2015
24 Further, it is relevant to consider what has happened in your life since you committed the first offences against Dennis in January 1984. Between August 1984 and March 1985, in Penrith, NSW, when you were aged 18, you committed acts of sexual penetration of a boy who I am told was aged 16 - 17 years. For that offending, you were arrested and dealt with in 2004 for 3 charges of homosexual intercourse with a male aged between 10 and 18 and received a 2 year suspended sentence with probation.[7]
[7] Exhibit C
25 After that offending, you returned to Victoria in September 1985 and committed the offending in Charges 3 through to 6 against Dennis, then aged 13, when you were aged 19.
26
Back in NSW, in Lismore, you committed sexual offences against a third victim between January 1985 and December 1990. It can be seen that that overlaps with the second period of offending for which I am to sentence you today. I am told that boy was aged 14 at the time the offending began and you were aged 19, and the offending was described by you as a ‘sexual relationship’, which continued for 6 years. You were arrested in 1996 and sentenced in 1998 to
a term of imprisonment for 15 months for a number of charges of gross indecency[8]. I note that you were also charged with an indecent assault alleged to have occurred in 1983 in NSW, an allegation which predates the offending for which I am sentencing you, but although you were committed for trial on that charge, it did not ultimately form the charges for which you were sentenced in 1998.
[8] Exhibit C
27 In Queensland, between 1994 and 1996, when you were aged 28 - 30, you befriended a boy you had met when you sold a television to his mother, and over a period of months committed sexual offences against him, which you again described as a relationship. I am told that he was 14 years old at the start of the offending. A charge of maintaining an unlawful sexual relationship was brought in respect of this offending. This charge was dealt with in 2015[9], at the same time as a grooming offence committed by you between June 2013 and January 2014 against a 12 year old boy who you employed in one of the takeaway shops you then owned and operated, and you were also dealt with at that time for offences dated November 2013, involving failure to comply with reporting conditions as a reportable offender. For all offences, you were sentenced to 4 years’ imprisonment suspended for 4 years on probation after serving 601 days. You were released in September 2015, and remain liable to supervision in Queensland until 2019.
[9] Exhibit D
28 You were arrested on this matter involving Dennis in Queensland on 4 August 2016, and extradited on 5 August to Victoria, where you have been on remand ever since. All charges throughout this history, except the grooming charge, involved oral penetration of the victims.
29 You have also been dealt with by courts in Western Australia, NSW and Queensland for offences involving driving and dishonesty matters, as well as some earlier failing to comply with reporting conditions.
30 In those circumstances, while it is relevant to consider that you could have been dealt with under a different regime in the Children’s Court had the first two charges relating to Dennis come to court shortly after they were committed, the reality is that by the age of 19, you had sexually offended against three boys in two States. You continued to reoffend against male children, adding the State of Queensland to your dreadful list, as you moved further into adulthood, and although there has been no contact sexual offence since 1996, I do not consider you have fully rehabilitated. I agree with the sentencing remarks of His Honour Judge Devereaux SC of the District Court as to your rehabilitation and character[10] who did not know about all of the offences that I know of. Because of your shocking record of offending between 1984 and 1996, when there was no rehabilitation, the passage of time to today’s sentence has minimal impact as a mitigating factor. I will return later to consider your rehabilitation further.
[10] Ibid
31 The factor that your counsel relied on as the most significant mitigating factor is your own background of sexual abuse and childhood trauma, the details of which are contained in the psychological report of Mr Simon Candlish.[11]
[11] Exhibit 2
32 In summary, it is reported by you that you grew up in a household where you witnessed your father, who was an alcoholic, being violent to your mother. When you were 5, your sister died at the age of 6 months and your father left. Your mother had a breakdown, which at your young age you did not understand, and all you knew was that you did not see her for 12 months and were living with your grandparents. You were first sexually interfered with at the age of five and a half by a boy aged 12 - 13 years. You resumed living with your mother and she re-partnered with another alcoholic man who abused her, and also abused you emotionally, physically and sexually until your mother left him when you were aged 10. During that time, you report you were sexually abused by two other men. The family history is largely confirmed by your uncle in a reference he wrote.[12]
[12] Exhibit 3
33 The law is that the fact that an offender was abused as a child may bear upon the offender’s personal circumstances, and go to the issue of moral culpability and rehabilitation, and will be relevant to the sentencing disposition when there is expert evidence drawing a clear connection between the sexual offending and the offender’s own victimisation[13]. In his report, in my view, Mr Candlish does not draw a clear connection. He describes “possible underlying mechanisms”, resulting in your criminal behaviour, but in detailing these, emphasises them as possibilities. (See [123] – [127] of his report).[14]
[13]R v AWF [2000] VSCA172; GEM v R [2010] VSCA 168; Bourne v R [2011] VSCA 159
[14] Exhibit 2
34 As a result, I am not satisfied that there is a clear connection between your traumatic childhood and your offending and so that background does not operate to reduce your moral culpability, nor impact on the need for general and specific deterrence. However, the trauma you suffered as a child is still highly relevant as a general mitigating factor and I take it into account in that way, bearing in mind the presumption of harm to a child which can be long-term and serious and both physical and psychological[15].
[15]R v Clarkson (2011) 32 VR 361, 368 [26], 371 [33]
35 You are homosexual and you are unsure if your sexual abuse has led to that orientation. You hate the fact that you are homosexual and neither you nor your mother accept this. This is despite you having two long term, age appropriate adult intimate relationships with men.
36 Your mother re-partnered when you were in your mid-teens and that man has been your stepfather ever since. You use his name. He provided stability to the family, which included your half-brother from your mother’s second relationship. I take into account that you continue to receive strong support from your mother, your step-father and the immediate extended family, despite them being shocked at the range of offending committed by you.
37 I also take into account that you have maintained a continuous work history in three States, including running your own businesses, but this is somewhat tempered by the fact that in two of those positions, you abused boys who you came into contact with through your work. I take into account that after each term of imprisonment, you have found or created further employment.
38 Returning to consider your prospects for rehabilitation, you completed a sex offender program in gaol in 1999, and the material before me shows that you have not committed a contact sexual offence since 1996. Mr Candlish found you have no signs of a psychopathic personality, nor personality dysfunction, nor strong anti-social views. He formed the view that you fall into the moderate - low risk category for sexual re-offending. However, some of your attitudes remain of concern to me, as reported to Mr Candlish. For example, you stated that you, “haven’t really been aroused to children” across your sexual life, [58], and you engaged in blaming the victim in describing the offending against Dennis, [47][16]. While these attitudes persist, there is still work for you to do, and some ongoing risk to male children.
[16] Exhibit 2, above n
39
I note that Mr Candlish considers that there are factors providing protection against re-offending to a moderate-high degree, including your intelligence, and that you have some capacity for empathy, effective coping skills and
self-control; that you are motivated to undertake further treatment; and that you have a pro-social and supportive network in your immediate family. It was put by your counsel that you now have some insight into the impact of your offending on Dennis, following the counselling about your own abuse that I am told you undertook in 1997, but I also note that Mr Candlish is of the view that your most optimal scenario for managing your future risk of re-offending is to develop improved insight into your childhood trauma, as well as improved coping skills.
40 On balance, I consider that your prospects for rehabilitation are reasonable, but yet to be fulfilled. It would enhance the protection of the community for you to undertake a further sex offender program, particularly designed to deal with the matters raised by Mr Candlish in his report [129][17].
[17] Ibid
41
Apart from those matters personal to you to which I have referred, I must also take into account deterrence, especially general deterrence which is of the utmost importance in cases involving sexual offending against children. That means that by my sentence of you the court must seek to deter others from committing sexual offences against children. I recognise that for charges 1 and 2, that purpose has less significance because you were not yet an adult in the eyes of the law. As to specific deterrence, although you have not committed
a contact sexual offence since 1996, for the reasons expressed above I still consider that specific deterrence has a role to play in my sentence, in seeking to deter you from reoffending in any sexual way.
42 You are now aged 50, and are facing the possibility of another term of imprisonment, this time in a State where you have no connections and no geographically proximate support. Even though this is not your first time in custody, you are apparently experiencing some problems.
43 Your counsel submitted that an appropriate sentence would be to partially suspend any term of imprisonment imposed, so that, taking into account the time you have already served on these offences, you could be released and return to Queensland soon. The prosecutor submitted that such a sentence was outside the range of appropriate sentences.
44 You are to be sentenced for offences committed in 1984 - 1985. I have carefully considered the authorities in respect of regard to be had to sentences imposed in other cases at the time of the offending, but that is only one aspect to which regard may be had. I have been assisted by the case of CPD[18], where Table C sets out 25 cases, the dates of which indicate that many of them may involve the commission of sexual penetration offences during the same period as yours. However, I do note that table is in respect of sexual penetration of a child under 10.
[18] [2009] VSCA 114
45 I have also had regard to the clear statements of the Court of Appeal[19], that the lapse of time since the commission of the offences, is not unusual, and that,
“It is incumbent upon the courts, however long ago the offences were committed, to express the denunciation of the community of such behaviour through the sentences imposed on perpetrators”.
[19]DPP v Toomey [2006] VSCA 90, [14], [17]
46 The applicable principles for this sentence in all of these circumstances appear to me to be as follows:
· Existing sentencing practice does not constrain a sentencing judge from imposing a higher or lower sentence than the prevailing practice[20];
[20]DPP v Dalgliesh [2016] VSCA 148, [118]
· Over time, views may change about the length of sentence which should be imposed in particular cases, and when that occurs, the notions of manifest excessiveness or manifest inadequacy will be affected, and one must allow for the possibility that sentences to this point have simply been too low[21];
[21]DPP v OJA (2007) 172 A Crim R 182 , [31]
· The guidance provided by current sentencing practices for a particular offence may conflict with the guidance provided by the statutory maximum, and where that is so, the requirement to have regard to current sentencing practices does not foreclose the possibility of an increase in the level of sentences[22]; and
[22]CPD, [7], citing R v AB (No 2) (2008) 18 VR 291, [68], [71]-[74]; CPD, [72]-[81]
·
The Court of Appeal in 2009, and again in 2016, found that there is
a disparity between the maximum penalties and the sentences handed down for sexual penetration offences against children[23], with a real question as to the adequacy of current sentencing. That must be an even more important question if considering sentences imposed some time ago.
[23]CPD,[8]-[9]; DDJ (2009) 22 VR 444, [72]; Dalgliesh,[87]
47 I therefore propose to sentence in accordance with the applicable principles. These include a starting point[24] of imposing proper and proportionate[25] sentences individually on each charge, taking into account the factors in mitigation, including that you were under 18 when you committed the offending in Charges 1 and 2, before turning to concurrency and cumulation and ultimately, totality[26].
[24]Bauer (a pseudonym) v R [2015] VSCA 55, [194]
[25] As the prisoner is a ‘serious sex offender’, a disproportionate sentence may be imposed.
[26] Totality is qualified by the ‘serious sex offender’ regime – see HMcL v R (2000) 174 ALR 1, [76]; Gordon [2013] VSCA 343, [74]
48 There are two final matters before I turn to sentence. The first is that you are to be sentenced as a serious sexual offender for all the charges, as a result of your convictions in other States for sexual offences.[27]
[27] See Note 1 to section 34 Sex Offenders Registration Act
49 Because of your status as a serious sex offender, I am required to regard the protection of the community from you as the principal purpose for which sentence is imposed. In order to achieve this purpose, I have the power to impose a sentence greater than is proportionate to your offence. However, the prosecution do not seek that, and I do not intend to do that.
50 It is also necessary for any sentences of imprisonment I impose today to be cumulative on each other unless I order otherwise, because of your status as a serious sex offender.
51 I have had regard to the serious sex offender sentencing regime and recognise there are limits placed by it on the application of the principle of totality[28]. However, I have still considered the need for today’s sentence to reflect to an extent the totality of your offending at the relevant times; that is, in respect of Dennis, 3 charges of sexual penetration of a child under 16; and 3 charges of an indecent assault of a child under 16; and in respect of other offending around that time for which you have already been sentenced, 3 charges of homosexual intercourse with a male aged between 10 and 18; and 6 charges of gross indecency.
[28]HMcL v R (2000) 174 ALR 1, [76]; Gordon [2013] VSCA 343, [74]
52
Because of the multiple constraints on me of sentencing a person who was
a child and young offender at the relevant times, current sentencing practice and totality, and the factors mitigating the seriousness of your offending, I will order that there be other than the total cumulation required by the serious sex offender regime, but the concurrency will be modest because of the seriousness of the offending. The exception will be the first two charges, committed 4 months before you turned 18.
53 The second matter is that as a result of my sentence today, you become a registrable sex offender in this State.You are already registered in NSW. You will be required within seven days of your release from custody to report your personal details and begin a regime of annual reporting in this State, required by the Sex Offenders Registration Act (Victoria) and be otherwise subject to the Act for the rest of your life. My Associate will now ask you to sign a document to acknowledge that you have received notice of these obligations.
54 Ms Barba, I would ask you to accompany my Associate to assist Mr Latimer, if required.
55 MS BARBA: Thank you, Your Honour.
56 HER HONOUR: Now just before I proceed to sentence, could I just check that there are no other matters that I have not yet dealt with, or I am about to deal with?
57 MR DONAGHY: Only the forensic sample, Your Honour, which I believe was discussed at the plea.
58 HER HONOUR: Yes, thank you. Yes, you have got the document there?
59 MR DONAGHY: I do, Your Honour.
60 HER HONOUR: Thank you very much, I will receive that. And that matter is consented to?
61 MS BARBA: It is, Your Honour.
62 HER HONOUR: Thank you.
63 Returning to you, Mr Latimer, application has been made for an intimate forensic sample to be taken from you and you have consented to this. I have signed the order, as I consider it is in the interests of justice that such an order be made, but I need to tell you that, although you have consented, the sample is taken by wiping a swab inside your mouth and if you change your mind, the authorities may engage in reasonable force to undertake that procedure.
64 Yes, could you stand up please.
65 You are convicted and sentenced as follows:
66 On Charge 1, sexual penetration of a child aged between 10 and 16 (composite) - 12 months’ imprisonment;
67 Charge 2, sexual penetration of a child aged between 10 and 16, 10 months’ imprisonment;
68 Charge 3, sexual penetration of a child aged between 10 and 16 (composite) - 20 months’ imprisonment;
69 Charge 4, indecent assault - 6 months’ imprisonment;
70 Charge 5, indecent assault - 6 months’ imprisonment;
71 Charge 6, indecent assault (representative) - 14 months’ imprisonment.
72 I make the following orders for cumulation in the usual terms, rather than in the terms required by the wording of s.6E Sentencing Act to make them easier to understand.
73
The sentence on Charge 3 of 20 months’ imprisonment is the base sentence.
I direct that 4 months of the sentences imposed on charges 4 and 5, and 12 months of the sentence imposed on charge 6 are to be served cumulatively on the sentence imposed on charge 3 and on each other. The sentences imposed on Charges 1 and 2 are wholly concurrent with all other sentences, because you were under the age of 18 at the time of their commission.
74 That makes a total effective sentence of 3 years 4 months’ imprisonment. I direct that you serve 20 months before becoming eligible for parole.
75 I declare that you have served 194 days in pre-sentence detention, not including today. These will be deducted administratively from your sentence.
76 I declare that in respect of all charges, you have been sentenced as a serious sex offender and direct that this be entered into the records of the court.
77 Finally, the sentence that I would have imposed if you had not pleaded guilty is difficult to determine, given the composite and representative charges. Doing my best, the sentence that I would have imposed if you had been convicted of the equivalent of 10 single events after a trial, is 5 years 6 months’ imprisonment, with a minimum of 4 years.
78 Are there any other orders or any matters arising out of that?
79 MR DONAGHY: No, thank you, Your Honour.
80 MS BARBA: No, Your Honour.
81 HER HONOUR: Yes, thank you, Mr Latimer may be removed.
82 I thank you for your patience. I will adjourn now until 10.30 tomorrow.
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