Leon Ronald Scarffe jailed for pedophile crimes against six boys over almost 30 years

A pedophile who controlled children through fear for 30 years has received a massive sentence from a judge who says he deserves no sympathy.

A “destructive, damaging and dangerous” pedophile who, for almost three decades, used his victims’ fear as “leverage” and forced them to be his “toys” will spend the next 28 years behind bars.

On Thursday, the District Court told Leon Ronald Scarffe he had perpetrated “immeasurable emotional and mental damage” to the six boys he abused between 1991 and 2020.

Judge Rauf Soulio said Scarffe used alcohol, cannabis, “classic processes of grooming”, coercion and “manipulative tactics” to “pressure” the boys into submission.

If those boys – aged between 11 and 15 – refused his demands or tried to sever contact, Scarffe – aged between 20 and 50 – restored to “deplorable” threats.

“These offences were destructive, damaging and dangerous … you told one boy he ‘was using you’, (which is) classic projection and manipulation,” he said.

“You threatened you would send people to (another victim’s) house to beat him, that you would send sex toys to his address in his name.

“You threatened another that you would go to his house with friends of yours and beat him, and that the police would then arrest him.”

Scarffe, 53, of Mitchell Park, pleaded guilty to 12 charges including maintaining an unlawful sexual relationship with a child and unlawful sexual intercourse.

Hee ensured his victims’ silence by telling them that, if they reported him to police, he would send recordings of the offending to their families or publish the material on the internet.

Scarffe was arrested by SA’s elite Joint Anti Child Exploitation Team alongside members of an online pedophile syndicate led by Jadd William Brooker.

Initially, the court heard Scarffe was a member of that group – an allegation he repeatedly denied, despite several of his victims having also been abused by Brooker.

Following Scarffe’s guilty pleas, prosecutors told the court he and Brooker “were linked by victims” but there was “nothing connecting them individually”.

Scarffe should, they said, be sentenced “on the basis his offending against the victims was of his own initiative”.

Previously, Scarffe’s counsel claimed their client “lashed out” at his victims due to “a fear of rejection”.

On Thursday, Judge Soulio refused to accept that, saying it “did not mitigate” Scarffe’s crimes.

“The fact that you feared rejection provides no basis for a sympathetic view of your behaviour,” he said.

“You exploited the fact the boys involved had not come out to their families … you should have understood and respected the importance of having the freedom to come out at the appropriate time.”

He sentenced Scarffe to 28 years’ jail, with a non-parole period of 22 years and six months.