Wilson Nathaniel sentenced for rape and stealing Cairns police car in spree that ened with shots fired
A young offender on a terrifying one man crime wave who raped a woman multiple times and stole a police car before being shot in the face has received little sympathy from a sentencing judge.
A young offender on a terrifying one man crime wave who raped a woman multiple times and stole a police car before being shot in the face has received little sympathy from a sentencing judge.
Wilson Nathaniel, 22, was sentenced by Brisbane judge Sarah Farnden KC at Cairns District Court on Friday via video link.
Nathaniel on August 5 pleaded guilty to 24 offences across three indictments with Ms Farnden stating his most serious crimes included two counts of aggravated burglary, two counts of assault with intent to commit rape and three counts of rape.
While his offending spree on March 27, 2024 ended in a dramatic police chase, standoff and shooting, with the bullet striking his jaw, the court was told his criminal acts began earlier in the month and involved disability support workers who worked for a firm he was a client of.
Ms Farnden said Nathaniel was an NDIS recipient and that his “hours of assistance” had been reduced in the lead-up to his offending.
She said Nathaniel at about 2.30am one night in March was intoxicated and went to the home of the manager of his NDIS provider and made threats to the family by telling the staffer’s husband: “You f**ked with the wrong man.”
On March 17, 2024, staff from his disability support organisation went to Nathaniel’s unit to discuss breaches of their policies when he threatened to punch them, and stab them with a knife.
Ten days later on March 27, 2024, Nathaniel committed his most “serious” crimes, Ms Farnden said.
The court was not provided with detail on where Nathaniel committed his attempted rape and rape offences but Ms Farnden said Nathaniel had identified one of his victim’s the night before.
“At about 8pm on the 26th of March, (the victim) was on her way home when you rode past her on a bicycle, you asked if she lived at the property (and) she told you that it was none of your business,” Ms Farnden said during sentencing.
“You then rode off and said that you would come back later.”
The court was told the following morning at 4am, the victim woke up to what “she described as an unusual smell” and saw Nathaniel crouching at the end of a bed holding a fishing knife and a bottle of wine.
The victim then reached for her phone which Nathaniel took and put in his bag, before letting her use the toilet before the victim ran out of the house in her underwear crying for help.
Ms Farnden said Nathaniel then left the property and went next door.
After a brief conversation with the offender she ran away after he had grabbed her hand and tried to drag her behind a nearby bin.
Meanwhile the first victim had returned to her property with a male friend to search for Nathaniel and after the friend couldn’t find him, he left and the victim was making herself a coffee when the offender appeared again.
“You came towards her, she threw her coffee at you, she tried to run towards an opening, she missed,” Ms Farnden told the court.
“She collided with the door and fell to the ground, you then grabbed her by the ankle and dragged her across the concrete floor. This caused injuries to her. She was trying to fight you off, she was hitting you in the face, she was screaming at you to let her go.”
The court was told Nathaniel then raped her as she fell in and out of consciousness.
“Whilst raping her you said to her that you were sorry and that you could not get her off your mind from when you had first seen her that night.”
And when the victim made another attempt to flee, Nathaniel grabbed her by the throat, and was using a screwdriver to threaten her life, before he raped her another two times.
Police eventually arrived after neighbours had heard the pleas and made calls but Nathaniel had escaped from the back of the property.
Later that morning Nathaniel stole a police car and led officers on a three-hour chase around Newell St and Mulgrave Rd during which he threw metal objects at officers and at cars before dousing himself in what police assumed was fuel to prevent them from tasering him.
Ms Farnden said he was eventually boxed in by police cars, shot by an officer which caused a fracture to his jaw but he had since recovered.
Ms Farnden said Nathaniel had been before the courts on 26 prior occasion both in Queensland and Northern Territory.
“You have previously been sentenced to every type of order including ones to assist in rehabilitation. You have breached many of those orders,” Ms Farnden said.
“You continue to commit criminal offences.”
Ms Farnden detailed Nathaniel’s traumatic childhood which she said featured neglect, exposure to domestic violence and alcohol abuse as well as there being a failure to provide him with medical attention.
She said he had been diagnosed with ADHD, foetal alcohol spectrum disorder, and an intellectual disability as well as PTSD from events including having hot water thrown on him, having his head split by an iron bar, and being told his father was dead, despite that not being true, all while he was a child.
“In my view, you do remain a risk to the community, and protection to a community remains a significant factor in arriving at a sentence, although I accept what your counsel has said about the effect of your disadvantaged childhood,” Ms Farnden said.
“I must take into account those factors in a real way.
“However, I must also impose a sentence that reflects the criminality of all of your offending across the three indictments.
“In my view, the appropriate head sentence to take into account all of those factors is 14 years imprisonment.”
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Originally published as Wilson Nathaniel sentenced for rape and stealing Cairns police car in spree that ened with shots fired
