Child abusers in court in the Wide Bay and Burnett
‘Vile’ and ‘nauseating’ are words used by judges in describing some of the crimes of these men, who range from mechanics and bartenders to respected businessmen. In the past year, they have been convicted in courts across the Wide Bay and Burnett.
Police & Courts
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Keeping the next generation of children safe is important for Australia’s future.
Child sexual abuse can be verbal, physical or emotional. Both the police and courts consider it a serious matter. With the progression of the internet, online spaces have increasingly become an area of concern, and parents are encouraged to build safe online practices with their children.
Unfortunately, child abuse can occur with adults or other children who are in a position of power. In Australia. about 2.7 million people have experienced either physical or sexual abuse before the age of 15, the 2022 ABS personal safety survey reported.
Women are more likely than men to experience sexual abuse before the age of 15.
Here are some of the cases the courts in the Wide Bay and Burnett have dealt with in the past year. The cases are sinister and reinforce the need to address the abuse of power, increase awareness, and ensure the protection of children within our society.
These people are of all ages - young to old, and from all walks of life including tradesmen and respected businessmen, and have been convicted of child abuse offences.
In some cases, because of their relationship to their victim, it was legally forbidden to name them.
Unnamed Bundaberg man
A 53-year-old Bundaberg foster father, who cared for at least 25 children, was jailed in April 2022 after pleading guilty of indecent treatment of a child under 16 under care, and possessing hundreds of images of child exploitation material ranked as either Interpol Category 1 and 2.
Two of his foster children discovered the child exploitation images on his computer, along with images of another foster child.
The majority of the children in the images were under the age of 10.
The court heard the man had suffered medical issues as a result of alcoholism.
Judge Nathan Jarro condemned the man’s actions.
“These offences are offences for which, unless extreme circumstances are shown, an actual term of imprisonment is required,” he said, adding that no such circumstances existed in this case.
“You were supposed to protect her, not exploit her.”
He received a head sentence of 18 months, suspended after six, with an operational period of two years and two years’ probation.
Read the full court account here.
Unnamed Maryborough man (39)
A Maryborough bartender, who cannot be named for legal reasons, pleaded guilty in Maryborough District Court to indecent dealing.
The court heard the man, 39, had consumed a significant amount of beer and Jager bombs the night he woke to his toddler screaming and took his two-and-a-half-year-old daughter into the garage.
The court heard his admissions to police that he’d touched his screaming toddler on her genitalia to try and “soothe her”.
During his sentencing, Judge Michael Byrnes remarked on the idea of touching the child’s genitalia to stop her from screaming.
“Hearing it out loud makes you realise how obscene what you admitted to doing is,” he said.
The man was sentenced to 12 months in prison, suspended immediately with an operational period of two years.
He would remain on a sex offenders’ register for five years, the court heard.
A conviction was recorded.
Leslie James Kyte
In April 2022, Bundaberg man and diesel mechanic Leslie Jame Kyte pleaded guilty to three counts of indecent treatment of a child under 16, one count of maintaining a sexual relationship with a child, one count of making child exploitation material, two counts of possessing child exploitation material, one count of distributing child exploitation material, one count of using a carriage service to access child exploitation material and one count of intended indecent treatment of a child under 16, under 12.
Kyte was found to be in possession of 488 unique Interpol Category 1 images featuring children under the age of 10, and 38 videos showing boys aged between eight and 15.
“He had that material for five or six years,” crown prosecutor Carla Ahern told the court.
It was then he made full admissions of his offending, including the keeping of a diary, which he told police was to document his “conquests” and “training” of an 11-year-old boy who he abused over a three-month period.
The court heard that 18 out of 22 images in the diary were indecent and how Kyte had boasted in the diary about buying the child gifts like iPhones, video games and scooters “to ensure that the complainant would comply”.
Twelve incidents of sexual assault were documented by Kyte in the digital diary, which also contained exploitation videos.
He was sentenced to six years’ prison and became eligible for parole from July 28, 2022, taking into account 601 days spent in pre-sentence custody.
Jacob Daniel Honess
Jacob Daniel Honess, 26, pleaded guilty to unlawful carnal knowledge, making child exploitation material and indecent treatment of a child when he faced Maryborough District Court in March 2023.
The court heard the girl was 13 years old when Honess began exchanging messages with her on social media in 2021.
The two had an open relationship, which was on again, off again, the court was told.
He repeatedly asked her to send photos of herself naked, which she complied with, and he also sent a photo of his penis, the court heard.
One night, he arranged to meet with the girl about 10.30pm.
Honess filmed while the two had sex.
When he dropped her home later, he told her not to tell anyone and that he would kill himself if the police found out.
The offending was discovered later when someone opened the girl’s phone and saw the video images, the court was told.
He was sentenced to two years in prison, to be suspended after six months for an operational period of two years.
Honess was also placed on 18 months probation.
Unnamed Coffs Harbour man
A Coffs Harbour man, aged in his 30s, who cannot legally be named to protect the identity of his young victim, pleaded guilty in Gympie District Court in June 2022, to seven charges stemming from crimes committed over a three-year period from 2017 to 2020.
These included four counts of indecent treatment of a child under the age of 12 and in the man’s care, and charges of possessing child exploitation material, making child exploitation material, and distributing child exploitation material.
Police found more than 1100 images and 200 videos of the material across various electronic devices including the man’s phone.
The material included an image of a child as young as two months being violated.
Along with possessing the material, the man had created his own involving the autistic child of his then partner.
Judge Ian Dearden said he was “nauseous” to read the crimes to himself, let alone aloud for the court.
Mr Dearden noted the man was supported in court by his parents “despite everything”, and that he had a bachelor of education.
“Obviously that’s not going to be a career path for you given the offending,” Mr Dearden said.
The man was jailed for eight months, and will then be released on probation for three years.
Wayne Anthony Sheehan
Wayne Anthony Sheehan, an IT worker aged 64, was found guilty of two counts of indecent dealing after a trial at Maryborough District Court in March 2023.
He pleaded not guilty to performing a sex act on a teenage girl before getting her to touch him inappropriately while they were on a boat.
The incident happened between 2006 and 2007 when Sheehan was living in Maryborough.
He was sentenced to 18 months imprisonment, suspended after serving nine months with an operational period of three years.
Read the full court story here.
Keven Bernard Keogh
In September 2022, Bundaberg District Court heard the sinister details of 80-year-old Keven Bernard Keogh’s offending against children as young as four, including telling them to check his groin for ants.
After a three-day trial, a jury found Keogh guilty of four counts of indecent treatment of a girl under 16 (under 12) and one count of indecent treatment of a boy, under 16, (under 12).
Harrowing victim impact statements were read to the court by the prosecution, as Keogh, now a small-framed man with a walking cane, sat in the dock
The victims, who were abused by Keogh during the 70s and 80s while they were all under the age of 10, explained the damaging impacts of his offending.
One victim told the court they feared they were a “time bomb” and may themselves become an offender, before realising the fear was an unfounded consequence of having been abused.
Judge John Allen told the court that while personal deterrence was not a concern given Keogh’s current state of health, general deterrence was, and the community needed to know the abuse of children would attract punishment even if it was years later.
For the indecent treatment of the boy, Keogh was sentenced to two years in jail.
For the four counts of indecent treatment of the girl he was sentenced to 18 months in jail.
His sentences will run concurrently, and be suspended after he has served nine months, with an operational period of two years.
Unnamed Fraser Coast man
A 56-year-old Fraser Coast man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, pleaded not guilty to maintaining an unlawful sexual relationship with a child under 16 when his trial started on Tuesday, October 18, 2022.
Six days later, the jury returned a guilty verdict.
The court was told the man sexually abused his young nephew on a number of occasions, from the mid 1980s to the early 1990s.
Judge Michael Byrne KC described the man’s offending against his young nephew as “vile”.
On one occasion, Crown prosecutor Tony Cook said the man took his nephew to the shed where he attempted to have sex with him.
The boy told his uncle to stop, and was able to grab his clothes and leave, Mr Cook said.
There were also occasions of other sexual acts including oral sex, the court was told.
Mr Cook said the “secret relationship” was something the boy carried with him for many years.
The victim first told his ex-wife about the alleged sexual abuse in the early 2000s, and then told his family in 2019, Mr Cook said.
The man was sentenced to eight years jail and a conviction was recorded.
Unnamed Bundaberg man
A Bundaberg man found guilty of 10 counts of sexual abuse against children as young as eight has had an appeal against his conviction dismissed in the Supreme Court of Queensland in February 2023.
The man, who cannot be named to protect the identity of his victims, appealed a conviction handed down after a jury found him guilty in a lengthy trial in the District Court of Bundaberg on September 28, 2021.
The crimes the accused was found guilty of included maintaining an unlawful sexual relationship with a child under 12 during the mid-90s, with the abuse continuing into the early 2000s.
He was also accused of maintaining an unlawful sexual relationship with another child, aged under 16, also from the mid-90s to early 2000s, and that he had raped the child in that time.
The court had heard from one victim that the man had convinced his victims what he had been doing was “normal and natural”.
The court found no evidence that the verdict in the September trial had been unreasonable.
“ … the suggested weaknesses in the evidence have not been demonstrated to have reduced the probative value of the evidence in such a way that this court ought to conclude that, even making full allowances for the advantages enjoyed by the jury, there is a significant possibility that an innocent person has been convicted,” a document from the appeal hearing stated.
“This ground fails.”
On February 3, 2022, the man‘s appeal was dismissed before Justices Mullins, Morrison and Williams.
The man continues to serve his 12-year sentence, of which he must serve 80 per cent.
Read the full court account here.
Unnamed Gympie man
A man, 50, who cannot be named for legal reasons, pleaded guilty in Ipswich District Court to three counts of rape, seven counts of indecent treatment of a child under 16, grooming a child under 16, indecent treatment of a child under 12, making child exploitation material, possessing child exploitation material, and six counts of failing to comply with his reporting conditions in September 2022.
The court heard the offences occurred throughout 2020 and 2021, against the daughter of the man’s girlfriend at the time.
Throughout that time, he indecently touched her when dropping her at school, raped her on multiple occasions, sent her inappropriate photos and a video of himself, sent her inappropriate messages, and photographed and filmed her naked.
Crown prosecutor Jacqueline Malouf said the man engaged in multiple programs throughout previous periods of probation to address his issues, but his probation reports noted that he “showed no insight into his offending and was unwilling to take responsibility for his offending”.
She also noted a victim impact statement had not been tendered to the court, but said “it’s very obvious that offending of this nature will be detrimental to any child”.
The man was given a head sentence of nine years imprisonment, and his parole eligibility was set for May 9, 2024.
His 371 days of presentence custody were declared time-served.
Keith Lance Ward
Keith Lance Ward, 41, pleaded guilty to one count of rape and one count of indecent treatment of a child under 16 when he appeared before Maryborough District Court in March 2023.
Judge Michael Burnett said Ward had been trusted by his young victim.
In her victim impact statement, the girl had spoken of being ashamed and embarrassed by the incident.
Ward was sentenced to three years in prison, to be suspended after 12 months with an operational period of four years.
He was placed on 18 months probation.
Unnamed Fraser Coast man
A 72-year-old Fraser Coast grandfather was found guilty of raping his young granddaughter after a three-day trial in Hervey Bay District Court in September 2022.
In her opening statement, crown prosecutor Elise Sargent told the court the offending took place when the girl visited her “nan and pop’s” house on the Fraser Coast.
Ms Sargent said the girl’s grandfather was her step-grandfather, but in her life, she called him “pop”.
She told the court there were four particular instances the girl remembered, starting from when she was seven years old.
Judge Tony Moynihan QC sentenced the 72-year-old man to five years jail for maintaining an unlawful sexual relationship with a child, and two years and six months jail for four counts of rape.
Tristane Shane William Webb
Tristane Shane William Webb, 32, a mechanic from Monkland, pleaded guilty in Gympie District Court in September 2022, to 20 crimes committed across a period of more than a year.
Webb pleaded guilty to grooming, indecent treatment of a child, two counts of rape, five counts of indecent treatment of a child under 16, five counts of common assault, assault occasioning bodily harm, wilful damage, serious threatening violence, unlawful stalking with violence, two counts of threatening violence at night, and strangulation (relating to a third matter unconnected to the grooming or stalking crimes).
He was supported in court by his mother, who sat in the gallery crying as the details of Webb’s offending were laid bare in a marathon sentencing hearing which ran more than three hours.
Judge Bernard Porter said Webb groomed a young girl over a prolonged period using a combination of manipulation, his “position of power”, force and persistence.
At one point, the court was told, when the girl pointed out the age difference he told her “anything above 12 is OK”.
Judge Porter handed Webb a seven-year jail term, making him eligible for parole from May 1, 2023.
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If you believe a child is in immediate danger or a life-threatening situation phone triple-0 (000)
If you have reason to suspect a child is experiencing, or is at risk of abuse, contact:
Regional Intake Service (Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm) or the Child Safety After Hours Service Centre on 1800 177 135 if outside business hours.
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If you are struggling with mental health or this story has raised any issues, call Lifeline on 13 11 14.
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