Director of Public Prosecutions v Morello (a pseudonym)
[2020] VCC 1835
•18 November 2020
| IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA AT MELBOURNE CRIMINAL DIVISION | Revised Not Restricted Suitable for Publication |
Case No. CR-19-01331
| DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS |
| v |
| DANTE MORELLO (A PSEUDONYM) |
---
| JUDGE: | HER HONOUR JUDGE MARICH |
| WHERE HELD: | Melbourne |
| DATE OF HEARING: | 9 November 2020 |
| DATE OF SENTENCE: | 18 November 2020 |
| CASE MAY BE CITED AS: | DPP v Morello (a pseudonym) |
| MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION: | [2020] VCC 1835 |
REASONS FOR SENTENCE
---
---
| APPEARANCES: | Counsel | Solicitors |
| For the Director of Public Prosecutions | Ms C. Duckett | Solicitor for the Office of Public Prosecutions |
For the Accused | Mr J. Lavery and Mr R. Thyssen | Ann Valos Criminal Law |
VICTORIAN GOVERNMENT REPORTING SERVICE 212731
HER HONOUR:
Introduction
1Dante Morello1, you have pleaded guilty to an indictment containing five charges of indecent act with a child under 16 years, each of which carries a maximum penalty of 10 years’ imprisonment.
2The circumstances in which you came to commit those offences are set out in the Summary of Prosecution Opening for Plea dated 27 October 2020, which was exhibited into evidence as Exhibit A, and also read aloud in part at the hearing of your plea in mitigation of penalty.
3The prosecution also relied on the Victim Impact Statement of Melanie Stuart2 dated 4 November 2020, which was exhibited as Exhibit B and also read into evidence by the complainant.
4In addition to making oral submissions, your counsel relied upon an Outline of Plea Submissions dated 4 November 2020 (Exhibit 1) and a psychological report prepared by Jeffrey Cummins dated 29 October 2020 (Exhibit 2). Since the conclusion of the plea in mitigation of penalty, I have received a supplementary report of Jeffrey Cummins dated 11 November 2020, which I will now receive into evidence and mark as Exhibit 3.
5I have had regard to each of those documents in preparing these Reasons for Sentence, in addition to the matters advanced in oral argument.
Circumstances of the offending
6
During the period of offending, which spans between 1996 and 2003, you were aged between 29 and 36 years of age. In or around 1993, you commenced a de facto relationship with the victim’s mother, Mary-Anne Stuart3. You started living together at a property located at an address in
1 A pseudonym.
2 A pseudonym.
3 A pseudonym.
Sunshine with Ms Stuart’s two children from a previous relationship, the complainant’s older brother, and the complainant, who was, in 1993, aged approximately four years. As the complainant was estranged from her biological father, you became a father figure to her.
7You favoured her over her brother, by taking her out to do “special things”, such as getting potato wedges in Sunshine, reprimanding her brother when he fought with her, giving her toys and clothes, and singing and dancing with her. She was approximately four to five years of age when you started living together at the Sunshine property. At that age, she was comfortable walking around her home naked, but she lost comfort as she noticed you staring through the crack of her bedroom door while she got dressed. At this very young age, she started being very careful to shut her door as she dressed herself. I was told that you found excuses to enter her bedroom while she was getting dressed under the pretence of it being by accident or to ask her a question.
8During her childhood, the victim’s bedroom routine involved you and her mother coming into her room separately to say goodnight and kiss her on the forehead. On some occasions, when you came in to kiss her goodnight, you would kiss her on the lips and say “oh, sorry” – apparently under the pretence of it being an accident. The victim felt that something was very wrong with this, and felt motivated to tell her mother. However, she was afraid and choked on her words and did not mention this behaviour to her mother at the time, as is often the situation in these types of cases.
9In early 1994, the four of you moved to an address in Myrniong. Between 1 January and 31 December 1996, when you were approximately 29 years of age and the victim was approximately eight years of age, you again moved to live at another address in Myrniong. You, she and her brother went fortnightly to Wombat State Forest to collect wood or drive around the country roads.
10On an occasion when her brother was not present, you invited the victim to sit on your lap to steer the driving wheel of your car while you continued to operate the pedals, and she was thrilled at being able to do this. You told her to keep it a secret from her mother. Whilst she was on your lap, she could feel your groin against the back of her jumper and t-shirt. You started rubbing your penis against her back and continued doing so for approximately five minutes. This is the offending referrable to Charge 1 on your indictment, of indecent act with a child under the age of 16. The victim knew that it was your penis because of the way that it felt. She stayed on your lap until you arrived at the forest.
11Whilst the victim was in Grade 4 and approximately 9 or 10 years of age, she told a young friend that you had been touching her in the car with your penis. She felt scared that her mother would find out; that her whole family would find out; that she would lose her pets; that they would have to move to a new house again, or she would be taken away; so she later told the friend that she was just joking.
12In or around 1998, the four of you moved to a property at an address in Gordon and lived there until 2001. During this period you were aged between 31 and 34, and the victim was aged between 9 and 13. Whilst you lived at Gordon, you and the victim rode your bicycles together around the area.
13On one occasion between 1 August 1998 and 31 December 2001, during a bicycle ride, the victim stopped to pick blackberries and was talking to you. She looked down and saw your penis exposed through your shorts. This is the offending referrable to Charge 2, of indecent act with a child under the age of 16. You hugged her with your penis out, which she tried to ignore.
14At the Gordon property you had a work shed filled with tools. The victim recalls an occasion when you and she were alone in the shed together, and you were talking to her whilst you were standing at the work bench. She
looked down and saw your penis exposed through the front of your denim shorts. This is the offending referrable to Charge 3 on the indictment, of indecent act with a child under the age of 16. She continued the conversation as normal and pretended that she did not notice.
15On an occasion whilst you were living at the Gordon property, you played hide and seek with the victim and her friends. She was worried that you might behave in a sexualised way towards her friends, so she volunteered to hide with you to take the bullet. On one occasion, the two of you hid in a large dog kennel. You lifted up the carpet mat in the dog kennel and showed the victim a pornographic magazine depicting women on women, and women on men, giving them blow jobs. She later retrieved the magazine and gave it to her mother, telling her where she had found it, but she did not mention anything else.
16From 2001 to 2003, the four of you lived at a property in Greendale. Whilst you were living there, you began trying to talk to the victim about sex, asking her about the boys she was interested in, and whether or not she masturbated.
17In 2003, whilst the victim was 13 years old turning 14, the four of you lived at a property located in Ballarat East. You were a hairdresser and used to cut the victim’s hair. On an occasion whilst you were doing so, you grabbed the inside of the victim’s upper thigh, close to her vagina, and said “you’re so soft, women are meant to be soft”. The victim was wearing shorts at the time and regretted that she was wearing shorts.
18During this time, you owned a Holden Commodore and used to give the victim lifts to various places. Whenever she was in the car with you alone, you would take your penis out and rub yourself while you were driving. The victim would look out the window and pretend it was not happening. She was too scared to say anything. Sometimes you would stroke her inner thighs and say
that her skin was soft or her shape was nice. You asked her to watch you ejaculate and encouraged her to do so multiple times. However, the victim never looked and always stared out of the window. She recalls you grunting, breathing heavily and saying “Melanie, I want you to watch me come”.
19On an occasion between 1 January and 10 October 2003, you asked the victim to watch you ejaculate. It was in the middle of the day and you were driving about two blocks from your home in Ballarat East. The victim could see that you were fondling your penis more vigorously than usual in her peripheral vision. She could hear you breathing heavily. This is the offending referrable to Charge 4, of indecent act with a child under 16. She did not say anything in response to you asking her to look. She just continued looking out of the window until she exited the car.
20On another occasion between 1 January and 10 October 2003, the victim was travelling as a passenger in your car with you. It was early in the evening and you were at the traffic lights in Bakery Hill, Ballarat. She was either in Year 8 or Year 9, and she was on her way to a party or gathering. Whilst at the traffic lights, she could see you fondling your penis outside your pants in her peripheral vision. This is the offending referrable to Charge 5 on the indictment, of indecent act with a child under 16. Again, she just turned her head and looked away.
21When the victim commenced high school, she disclosed to two friends that she had been abused by a man and thought about killing herself all the time. She told a third friend. However, she did not name you as her offender because you were still assaulting her, you all lived together, she felt humiliated and did not want to scare them into not visiting. When she was about 16 years of age she disclosed to two friends that it was you that was abusing her.
22On an occasion when she was 14 years of age, you started telling her off, and she replied, “Leave me alone or I am going to tell Mum that you hit on me.” She reported that your face dropped and you looked guilty, and you replied, “I haven’t been hitting on you Melanie, I can’t explain, but if you knew what was going on in my head,” and you started to become teary. She threatened to go to the police, and you replied “I didn’t actually touch you,” and that, “if you were my biological daughter it might have been different.” After this, you stopped masturbating in front of her, stopped making sexual remarks, and no longer touched or looked at her in a sexual way.
23In 2006, when the victim was 16 years of age, she told her mother that you had been exposing yourself with an erection since she was little. The victim’s mother confronted you that night, and you completely falsely denied it and claimed that the victim was, “making it up because [you] were not getting along.” At the time, the victim’s mother asked you to move out and you left the property, returning sporadically to the property for varying periods of time. On one occasion, you told the victim’s mother that you had an erection in front of the victim, as she had seen you in the shower and shown an interest. You told the victim’s mother that it was the victim’s fault and/or that you were immature and had never grown up.
24A couple of years later, the victim told her mother about the offending and that most of the offending had happened when you were in the car together, including the victim sitting on your lap whilst you had an erection and masturbating in the car.
25On later occasions, the victim confronted you about the offending, and you replied in words suggesting that the victim had, “got off lightly in terms of sexual abuse.” You told her about all the things you had done for her and given to the victim throughout her life, and that if she went to the police it would destroy your family and kill your mother.
26In 2009, when she was 19 years of age, the victim had a further discussion with you about what you had done to her, and you started crying and saying you were sorry. In 2012, you started leaving notes saying, “Sorry for what I done to you” on the victim’s car. This continued for the next three years.
Investigation, arrest and interview
27In June 2018 the victim reported the matter to police. In November 2018 arrangements were made for a pretext call to be made to you by the victim. I note that the Summary of Prosecution Opening contains very detailed extracts from this pretext conversation, which will be copied and set out in full in an annexure to these Reasons for Sentence.
28During that pretext conversation, you told the victim that you did not mean any harm, you never did; all you wanted was to fulfil a need that you were not getting. That need was sexual in nature. You accepted that you told her mother that the victim was making up false memories about a lot of it, which you did because you did not want to go to jail. You know that you “fucked up”. You told her that you were very, very remorseful for your behaviour, and that every day, once or twice a day, you would think that you had “fucked [the victim] up.” You considered that the victim deserved a lot better, and you accepted that you treated the victim like a sex object. The first time you sexualised the victim was when she was five or six years old. You told the victim that she showed a lot of curiosity, and it confused you because you were not getting that from the victim’s mother. You told her that you were fascinated with her, and the simple reason was because she was returning something that you were not getting from her mother.
29During the pretext call, you agreed that you would sit the victim on your lap in the car and get her to steer the wheel, and masturbate behind her. You claimed that it was not really like you were aroused by a child, it was more the sexual action that was arousing you and the excitement of it. You were
probably trying to hurt the victim’s mother more than you were trying to hurt the victim.
30In relation to the victim alleging that she was steering the car and that you would rub your penis on her back and masturbate behind her while she was on your lap, you said that was, “pretty fucked up ... so sorry.” You accepted your behaviour was, “gross, [which] is actually a light word to use for it, it’s actually fucking disgusting.” You told the victim that her mum was leaving all the time to go have sex with other men, and leaving you alone. You accepted your behaviour was “a hundred per cent wrong” and that “any person in their right mind would never even think about behaving in that manner towards a child at all”.
31On 19 December 2018, you were arrested and interviewed at the Sunshine Police Station. You accepted that you were a father figure to the victim. You denied masturbating in front of her, but accepted masturbating under a blanket, maintaining that it was never in her face and it was always hidden. You told police that you never hurt her or made her do anything she did not want to do. In response to the allegation put by police that whenever you were alone in the car with the victim, you would always have your penis out and would rub yourself, and on multiple occasions asked the victim to watch you ejaculate, you stated, “There is a lot of made up stuff in that. Sorry, but there is. I don’t understand but that’s not correct.”
32You told police you were sorry for anything that you had done, and you did have full remorse and regret for any behaviour that you inflicted onto her. You then exercised your legal right to make no comment in relation to anything further that the police put to you.
Procedural history and plea of guilty
33You were charged in March 2019, and the matter proceeded through several committal mentions at the Magistrates’ Court, before proceeding by way of
straight hand-up brief on a plea of not guilty, with an indication by you that you may plead guilty to some charges. No witnesses were cross-examined at committal. You were initially self-represented in this Court, and the matter proceeded through procedural hearings in 2019, before eventually resolving after the final directions hearing, in August 2020, following successful plea negotiations between your eventual legal representatives and the prosecution.
34I consider this to be a plea of guilty midway through proceedings; however, I do have regard to the fact that no witnesses were exposed to the stress and inconvenience of cross-examination, and I consider that the plea has considerable utilitarian value, which I take into account in mitigation of penalty.
35I also consider that the plea is accompanied by remorse, which you have conveyed to the victim, to police and to Mr Cummins.
Effect on the victim
36I received a Victim Impact Statement into evidence prepared by the victim, Melanie Stuart and she read it aloud.
37She spoke movingly as to the significant trauma that you have caused her.
38She told me that before she could even comprehend what sex was, you stripped her of her ability to consent to sexual encounters. She was forced to endure a grown man leering at her frequently as a child and, as a consequence, she grew repulsed at her own body because of the attention it was given. She told me that she had no sense of safety in the world, least of all in her own home with her parents, who were supposed to keep her safe.
39She said that throughout primary school, she had to be vigilant when she had friends over for a play, as she did not want you to look at them the way that you looked at her, or touch anyone else the way that you touched her. In high school, she felt embarrassed, humiliated and confused most of the time, and started to think about ending her life.
40She never understood why she deserved this, and she has carried a constant feeling all of her life that she is not worth much as a person. She continues to have mental health issues, after trying so hard to resolve those for herself, and she notes that she has come a long way. She considers that she has not been able to have a healthy relationship with a partner, and that she thinks she chooses poorly because she still feels like she does not deserve to be treated well. Her life has been very lonely.
41In spite of your criminal actions towards her, and their effect on her, she has significant professional achievements, including a pending graduation with a Doctorate of Neuropsychology, and she has built a career of which she is deservedly proud. It has taken her near on 20 years to come to terms with what happened to her, and to realise that it is not her fault.
Personal circumstances
42As I have mentioned, at the time of offending you were aged between 28 and 36 years, and you are now 53.
43You were the youngest of eight children born to loving parents, and you had four brothers and three sisters, but one of your brothers is sadly now deceased. Your parents, with whom you were very close, are now also deceased. Your father worked at Massey Ferguson Foundry, and ceased work as a result of a work-related injury when steel fell on him. He then received a pension for many years before dying of lung cancer at age 82 in 2008. Your mother was always involved in home duties, and died at age 84, approximately nine years ago. None of your siblings are aware of your legal situation.
44You attended school in Sunshine and completed Year 10. You then attended another college, where you remained until three-quarters of the way through Year 12. However, you were expelled from school after a group of students,
including you, broke into one of the offices at the school and photocopied an exam.
45You completed a four year hairdressing apprenticeship and then, aged 24, you met the mother of the complainant.
46At around age 25 you commenced work as a labourer with the railways and you were progressively promoted. This work ceased around 2010, corresponding also with the end of your relationship with the complainant’s mother. You were then unemployed for approximately two years and then undertook employment involved in the recycling of vegetable oil, which you did for approximately two or three years.
47You are now in receipt of a JobSearch allowance and told Jeffrey Cummins, psychologist, that you had been in receipt of JobSearch for a number of years.
48You have a full driver’s licence, a truck licence and a backhoe licence.
49You are unpartnered.
50After you separated from the victim's mother, you became heavily involved with playing poker machines, and this has continued over the past five years, though you have never regarded yourself as having a gambling disorder or a gambling problem. You were a social user of amphetamines in conjunction with your de facto partner between the ages of approximately 24 and 32 years. In your early thirties you had, what you experienced as, amphetamine- induced psychotic symptoms.
51As a result of your current legal situation, you have engaged in suicidal thoughts. Over the past four or five months, you sought out and received mental health treatment via a mental health plan from a practitioner in West Sunshine, whom you have seen on approximately six occasions.
52Sadly, you reported to Mr Cummins that, at about the age of 12 or 13, you were sexually abused on one occasion by your brother, and you are ashamed about this, though you have no reason to be.
53Whilst at the commencement of offending you were, in the strict sense, of previously good character, I note that there have been a number of subsequent court appearances, including a significant appearance in February 2001 for trafficking in cannabis and theft for which you were placed on a suspended sentence of imprisonment. There have been no court appearances since a driving charge in May 2002. I take into account your prior good character.
54As I have mentioned, Jeffrey Cummins assessed you and has provided a report to me. When he asked you about the offending, you told him that you always knew that what you were doing was wrong. However, you had been lied to and cheated on by your victim’s mother, which you knew was no excuse, but you wanted to be loved. You told Mr Cummins that you have not told any of your siblings about your serious predicament.
55Mr Cummins administered relevant empirical testing and interpreted the results as indicating that there is no evidence of current attitudes in you supporting or condoning sexual offending or sexual entitlement. In his opinion, at the time of the offending, you had problems with stress related to your perceived difficulties with your de facto relationship. He does not assess you as having a specific sexual deviance such as paedophilia or hebephilia. In his opinion, your offending behaviour which occurred over a period of five years was situationally motivated and reflective of your frustration and distress associated with your de facto relationship.
56In his opinion, at the time of offending, it is very probable that you were then suffering from symptoms of depression with anxious distress, which was recurrent in type and of moderate severity. However, Mr Cummins
acknowledges that this mental health condition was not diagnosed at the time you were offending, and you never received any mental health treatment.
57You now report frequent and typically daily negative ruminative thinking and disturbed sleep regarding both your offending behaviour and the likelihood that you will be imprisoned.
58In the opinion of Mr Cummins, you are reporting reactive mental health symptoms which are not currently of sufficient magnitude to justify you being diagnosed with a major depressive disorder, a trauma and stressor-related disorder, or with any other major mental illness.
59You are currently a daily smoker of cannabis and you are diagnosed with a cannabis use disorder.
60In Mr Cummins’ opinion, your risk of re-offending is low to moderate and is already trending towards low. In terms of offence-specific treatment, it is his opinion that you could benefit from, and require, offence-specific treatment with a focus on why you did not leave your de facto relationship with the victim’s mother, given your concerns about feeling ignored, lied to, taken advantage of, and emotionally abused by your de facto partner. In Mr Cummins’ opinion, it is appropriate that you participate in offence-specific treatment.
Objective gravity of the offending; moral culpability
61Your counsel has appropriately accepted that each of these charges involved a serious breach of trust, and your offending has had a serious effect on the victim.
62I consider the offending referrable to each charge to be serious. In relation to Charge 1 the victim was aged only approximately eight years of age. You engineered the opportunity for her to sit on your lap to steer the car, and rubbed your penis against her back. You exploited cynically the opportunity for
sexual contact which being in that position of trust presented. Your offending, apparently motivated in part by your sense of sexual isolation from your partner, led to your exploitation of her. She was so young and in such a vulnerable position.
63Between two and five years later, on the two occasions in Charges 2 and 3, you exposed your penis to her through your shorts whilst you were caring for her as her effectively de facto father. During that period, you engaged in other sexualised behaviour with her, though she was only 10 to 13 years of age. Though that behaviour is not charged, it demonstrates that Charges 2 and 3 did not occur in isolation, and substantiates the victim’s concerns – in effect, that she was never completely safe from you during this period.
64In 2003, when the victim was 13 years of age and turning 14, you committed Charges 4 and 5, each of which involved you masturbating whilst she was trapped in your car. The offending the subject of Charge 4 was accompanied by your request that she watch you ejaculate. On these occasions, you engaged in overtly sexual behaviour with the victim as a young teenager and, whilst they did not involve the contact to which you subjected her in your behaviour subject to Charge 1, they also represent a disturbing escalation in your attempts to elicit her involvement in your depraved and criminal activity by watching you masturbate to the point of orgasm.
65Your offending was again opportunistic, callous and exploitative as well as continuing to exploit the opportunity that your position of trust gave you. She was young and vulnerable, and you used her for your sexual gratification on these occasions over a period of five years.
Purposes of sentencing
66There is no doubt that sexual offences against children call for just punishment, public denunciation and general deterrence, as expressed for
instance by the Court of Appeal of Victoria in Shawcross (a pseudonym) v The Queen.4 This is also a case demanding specific deterrence.
67In relation to your prospects for rehabilitation, I have regard to Mr Cummins’ evaluation that your risk of re-offending is low to moderate and is trending towards low. Based upon your good character prior to these offences, and lack of subsequent sexual offending, I am cautiously willing to infer that your prospects for rehabilitation are likely to be good but provided that you engage in offender-specific rehabilitative courses.
68I note that upon being convicted and sentenced to terms of imprisonment on Charges 1 and 2 on the indictment, that you fall to be sentenced as a serious sexual offender on the remaining charges.
69Consistently with your counsel’s concession of the appropriateness of imprisonment and my own evaluation that imprisonment is warranted by these offences, pursuant to s 6B of the Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic) on Charges 3, 4 and 5, I must regard the protection of the community from you as the principal purpose for which sentence is imposed. Counsel for the prosecution noted that a disproportionate sentence was not sought in the circumstances of this case, and I do not intend to impose sentences on those charges which are disproportionate to the gravity of each offence considered in light of the objective circumstances.
70I note that should I sentence you to immediate custody, it coincides with the unhappy and serious risks posed to you and the other prisoners by the COVID-19 virus. A sentence would necessarily involve an initial two week isolation period, and you will be deprived of some of the ordinary concomitants of custody such as face to face visits should you be willing to confide in your family that you have this predicament, courses, and employment activities.
[2018] VSCA 295, [63].
Sentencing submissions
71Your counsel has accepted that I impose sentences of imprisonment on each charge. However, it was submitted that each sentence could be suspended in all of the circumstances of the case, having regard to the level of seriousness, the pleas of guilty, the delay in resolution of the victim’s complaints, your remorse, and the prospects for rehabilitation. I have reflected on this submission carefully, noting that it is disputed as being appropriate by the prosecution. Ultimately I am unable to accede to this submission and I intend to order immediate imprisonment on all charges, though I have also allowed a long period of parole eligibility to reflect the matters relied upon in mitigation and to provide incentive for your continued rehabilitation.
Sentence
72I now impose the following sentences:
On Charge 1, 18 months’ imprisonment, three months to be served cumulatively upon the base and other sentences, so that is not the base;
On Charge 2, 12 months’ imprisonment, two months cumulative upon the base and other sentences;
On Charge 3, 12 months’ imprisonment, one month cumulative upon the base and other sentences. On this count I declare you a serious sexual offender;
On Charge 4, two years and six months’ imprisonment, which is the base sentence. On this count I declare you a serious sexual offender;
On Charge 5, two years and six months’ imprisonment, six months cumulative upon the base and other sentences. On this count I declare you a serious sexual offender.
73The total effective sentence is therefore of three years and six months’ imprisonment, and I order that you serve two years and three months before parole eligibility.
Section 6AAA declaration
74Pursuant to s.6AAA of the Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic), I declare that had you pleaded not guilty to these charges and been found guilty of them, I would have sentenced you to a total effective sentence of four years and three months’ imprisonment, with a non-parole period of three years.
Ancillary orders
75As you have been found guilty of five registrable Class 2 offences, I declare you a registrable offender and I order that you comply with reporting obligations, as set out in the Sex Offenders Registration Act, for life. There is a package of information in front of you, Sir, that explains those obligations and before you are removed into custody I will trouble you please to sign the acceptance that you have received that paperwork.
76Ms Duckett, any other ancillary applications, any other applications or orders sought?
77MS DUCKETT: No, Your Honour. There were no further orders required in relation to the plea hearing, thank you.
78HER HONOUR: Yes, thank you. Mr Lavery, any further applications or orders?
79MR LAVERY: No, Your Honour.
80HER HONOUR: Thank you. I will stand down.
- - -
Annexure A
a)‘Everything [he] was doing was all childish in nature. Like, [he] was hiding and perving and it was all, you know, I won’t say innocent, but innocent in nature …. [he] didn’t mean no harm, never did. All [he] wanted was, you know, just to fulfil a need that [he] wasn’t getting.’ That need was ‘sexual’ ‘in nature, but it wasn’t sex’.
b)
In response to the Victim stating that the Offender ‘told mum that – that [she] was making up false memories about a lot of it. [That he] minimised it’, the Offender stated, ‘of course and when the Victim stated that he did that because he didn’t want to go to gaol, the Offender stated, ‘of course .
’
’
c)
He ‘just denied it.
’
d)
He knows he ‘fucked
up.’
e)The Victim was ‘a child --- and [she was] thrown into a load of crap.’
f)
The Victim ‘deserve[d] a lot better. [She is] a beautiful person, [she]’s very talented, all right, [she has] a great soul, all right, and [she]’s – [she]’s marvellous, man. [He] see[s] –[he]- well, [he] would like to say [he] see[s], but [he], you know, have an idea --- of, you know, just some of the things [she] do[es], and [she’s] a bright light
…
g)
He is ‘very, very remorseful for [his] behaviour.
’
h)‘Every day there isn’t much that [he], you know, don’t think --- once or twice a day that --- you know ---
he has ‘fucked [the Victim] up’
.
His ‘biggest remorse, more than – you know, [he] fucked up [his] relationship, but [his] biggest – what [he] did to [the Victim] and Glen.’
j)The Victim ‘deserved a lot better…’
k)He agrees that he treated the Victim like a ‘sex object’
l)He has ‘never touched or have – have been that way with anybody else but [the Victim]’ and ‘what [he] did was ‘horrific’
m)‘…everything was very childish for [him]
n)The first time he ‘sexualised’ the Victim was when she was ‘five or six years old’
o)
He ‘tried’ to put his penis into the Victim’s mouth but ‘never di
d’
p)Everything he did was ‘childish behaviour’
q)That he has ‘never ever thought of anyone else in the way that [he] treated [the Victim]
r)That the Victim ‘showed a lot of curiosity and it confused [him] because [he] wasn’t getting that from [the
Victim’s] mother
s)He knew what he was doing was ‘wrong’
t)His behaviour was ‘lewd behaviour’ and it was ‘wrong’
u)That he put the Nutella on the banana and tried to ‘set up the scenario’
What he did was ‘still pathetic and really bad’
w)He was ‘going to try and have oral sex’
‘It was basically putting – putting the Nutella on the banana, getting youse to close your eyes and I would
put the banana in your mouths…’
y)He was ‘fascinated with [the Victim] and ‘the simple reason [was] ‘cause [she] was returning something that [he] wasn’t getting from [her] mother.’
z)He was getting something from [the Victim] that [he] wasn’t getting from [her] mother, and that was just
– it was a simple thing of curiosity and not desire, [he] won’t say desire, even though, you know, all – it is a desire, but just the wanting, [the Victim] was wanting and curious with [him]…’
aa) The Victim was ‘being a hundred percent a child and that was it. And the problem was that [he] was stopping down and being a child instead of a grown up…’
bb) If he ‘wasn’t childish and [he] was being a – an adult, what [he] was doing would’ve been more a – a – a
violent and aggressive thing.’
|
The Admissions to particularised offending
40. During that pre-text call, the Offender further stated in response to the Victim’s allegations that;
dd) He agrees that he would sit the Victim on his lap in the car and get her to steer the wheel, ‘and masturbate behind [her]
.’
ee) He ‘got lost after all though’
ff) [In response to the Victim alleging that he masturbated against her whilst she was sitting on his lap when she was seven or eight years old], ‘… in hindsight, what [the Victim] says isn’t wrong … ‘but it wasn’t really – like [he] wasn’t aroused by a child. … It was more the sexual action that was arousing [him], the excitement of it. It wasn’t actual – you know, the thought of a child, it wasn’t there, it was jut something that was taken away from [him] – by [the Victim’s] mother
…’
gg) ‘It was only ever [the Victim]. There was – never, never [has he] ever felt or done anything like that with
anyone else … [he has] never thought of anybody else in that manner…
hh) The Victim is ‘just a victim of [her] circumstances.’
ii) In response to the Victim’s allegation that he was abusing a child, ‘But [he] – because [he] was being
fucked up in the head…
’
jj)‘… If you’ve got somebody who’s manipulating you, fucking with your head, you know what I mean, it’s only logical that you’re – you’re gunna do fucked up in your head shit. … The only reason that happened was because [he] was being fucked around [himself]…’
kk) He knows ‘what [he] did hurt [the Victim] and is hurting [her] still, and probably will for years to come.
You know, [she’ll] probably never stop hurting from it…
|
Victim’s] mother more than [her]. But [he] was feeling something, [he’ll] admit that … not as [her] being in a child [sic], but just the feelings that [she was] sort of – the curiosity side, and that excited [him] that’s what [he] wanted from [his] partner and [he] wasn’t getting. …
nn) In response to the Victim alleging that she was steering the car and then he would rub his penis on her back and masturbate behind her while she was on his lap, that ‘Pretty fucked up, [he] is so sorry’ and that ‘[he’ll] own up to it … [he knows] what [he] did was very wrong.’
oo)‘It wasn’t always, like, you know, [he] always groped [the Victim]’ … ‘what [he] did was fucked up, yes, but, jeez, it was fairly innocent as well … not innocent, it’s – [he knows] what… [he] did was bad, [he’s] not taking taking away when – [he means] by innocent, it’s just – it was – it was childish ‘cause a … bad person would’ve hurt [the Victim]… would’ve don’t something really, really bad and would’ve probably, you know, deserved to have been locked up and – like a fuckin’ dog or an animal, mate. … What I did,
all right, it was really bad and [he is] very, very sorry, but please understand and believe me, [he’s] never
– with anyone, don’t – ever have, never will with anyone else. [He doesn’t] have those desires with anybody, Jennifer.
’
pp) What he ‘did was wrong, was illegal, it was pretty atrocious, yes…’
qq) ‘… it was horrific. Yeah, it’s just pathetic childish behaviour, [he] would’ve destroyed – destroyed [the Victim’s] mentality ---‘
rr) He could ‘never make up for what [he] did…’
ss)‘What [he] did was fucked up, of course, Jen, but [he] is – when [he says] I am glad I never done anything violent or aggressive or forceful, it was of a childish nature ---‘
tt) In response to the Victim’s allegation that he would ‘trick [her] and coerce [her] into doing ---‘, his response being ‘Even though – yeah, of course.
’
uu) He ‘[knows] what [he] did was gross, all right. Gross is actually a light word to use for it, it’s actually fucking disgusting. [He is] very sorry, Jennifer, [he is]. Please, believe [him]. Now, [he] could never hurt anybody and least of all, you know, someone like [the Victim]. [She’s] a beautiful person and ---‘
vv) ‘[He knows’ … what [he] did was filth and [he] is very sorry for it … Now, I’m sorry, Jennifer. I’m so sorry. [He] knows there’s nothing [he] can say and do that will make it better … It’s fuckin’ pretty gross and … [he tries] to punish [himself] every now and then just to remind [himself] of how pathetic [he] was
…
ww) ‘There was – there was no conscious decision. [He] didn’t think nothing, [he] was just doing it,
Jennifer. It was just a total stupid act of pure foolish ---‘
xx) …’afterwards it was like nothing happened at all…’
yy)‘No, it just happened. It’s not like [he] calculated it … it just happened … [the Victim’s] mum was leaving us all, all the time, to go have sex with other men and leaving us alone. … Like, [he] was there to mind youse while she went out and played the field, mate, and got what she wanted elsewhere. … Come on, imagine what that did to [his] mind, man.’
zz) In response to the Victim alleging that he decided to sexually abuse her, the Offender’s response, ‘[he] didn’t – [he] never made a conscious choice … it’s everything just happened… It just happens in time. It does … You – you – you – you – you’re a person – you – you become a victim of your own circumstances. Everything just happened.’
aaa) He ‘stayed behind the curtain, [he’d] play with [himself] in the shadows where [the Victim] could
see him but [she] didn’t see [him] but [she] did see [him] but [she] didn’t. it was all stupid childish fuckin’
– you know, [he’s] grateful [he] wasn’t mean and fuckin’ forceful ---‘
bbb)In response to the Victim alleging that she did not remember that occasion, the Offender stated, ‘It’s called selective – selective memory as well. You know, you can remember what you wanna remember from all the situations and there’s probably heaps of them that you don’t even fuckin’ remember. There’s probably heaps I don’t even remember.’
He’s ‘aware what [he] done was wrong…’
He was ‘in a situation where [he] was fucked up … and done some fucked up shit…’
eee) ‘… what [he] did was pathetic, disgusting, disgraceful. If [his] mother and father fucking knew
… [his] father would kill [him]…
fff) ‘[The Victim was] so beautiful and [he] fucked [her] up. [He] is sorry.’
ggg)In response to the Victim alleging that the Offender encouraged her to drink alcohol and smoke to buy her silence, the Offender stated that he did not agree entirely but that he was ‘just trying to maybe get comfortable with [her] and make [her] feel comfortable with [him] and like [him]. And it wasn’t that
– you know, like [he] was trying to bribe [her] with – with that sort of stuff, it was just [he] was trying to
sort of fit in with [her] and make [her] feel comfortable with [him]. …
hhh) In response to the Victim asking him whether he could see ‘how wrong that is’, the Offender stated, ‘of course, of course. Come on, fuck’ and that ‘no – no child --- deserves that…
’
iii) ‘What he did was a hundred per cent wrong … any – any person in their right mind would never even think about behaving in that manner towards a child at all’ but that ‘[he] did and [he] wish[es] [he] could explain [himself] better to [her], for [her].’
jjj) He doesn’t ‘wanna be in any type of relationship with anybody because [he doesn’t] want to even think of a relationship with anybody, let alone another child…’
kkk) In response to the Victim stating that he was ‘sorry after [he] got caught’, the Offender stated, ‘….. in a way – in a way you’re a hundred per cent right but deep down [he] always knew that what [he] was doing was wrong
.’
|
In response to the Victim stating that he said to her, at the time, ‘I didn’t rape you, it’s not that big a deal. You can’t tell anyone because it’ll kill my mother’, the Offender stated, ‘But that was – that was protecting [himself]… and he ‘didn’t want to get charged’ and he ‘didn’t want to go to gaol….’
nnn) He will ‘do whatever [the Victim] want[s] from [him]’ and that he is ‘really, really sorry.’
ooo)He is ‘grateful that [the Victim] ha[s] it in [her] and that [she] is strong enough to even have just made this phone call --- let alone anything else … and let alone even just talk to [him], because, you know, most people would not even be able to, you know, say boo to the person that hurt them and harassed them and victimised them and basically assaulted them.’
ppp) He is ‘the sorriest [he] could ever be’
qqq) He is ‘sorry he hurt [the Victim]
rrr) ‘Nothing [he] could do – say, do or anything will ever undo what was done. What was done, [he] done it.
… Yes, [he] hurt [the Victim], all right. [He] is ashamed of [himself] for doing that, believe it or not. [He is] very ashamed of myself for – you know
.’