Convicted rapist Joshua Skvaridlo back before district court after police discover dating app

The South Burnett predator, who was also convicted of sexually groping a 12-year-old, found himself back before the court after cops busted him carrying out sneaky online rendezvous.

A Ballogie man convicted of raping a sleeping teenager and groping a 12-year-old child found himself back in hot water after police busted him using online dating sites and apps.

Joshua Skvaridlo, 35, pleaded guilty in the Kingaroy District Court to breaching his suspended sentence after police discovered he’s been using dating applications and encrypted messaging sites including WhatsApp, Snapchat and Plenty of Fish.

Crown Prosecutor Alex Stark said in 2018 Skvaridlo served 20 months of a five-year jail sentence for the rape of a 17-year-old girl.

“They’d been at a party, she went to sleep and woke up with (Skvaridlo’s) penis in her vagina. She pushed him off and promptly complained to others,” Mr Stark said.

The remainder of the jail sentence was suspended.

“Police investigators with child protection investigation units attended his address to conduct a compliance check with respect to his reporting obligations,” Mr Stark said.

“They identified numerous social networking accounts for dating applications and encrypted chatting applications.”

He also committed further breaches of his suspended sentence by racking up two drink driving charges and a disqualified driving charge, all of which are punishable by imprisonment.

Joshua Skvaridlo was convicted in 2018 for the rape of a sleeping teenager. File Photo.

The court heard Skvaridlo also faced the District Court in 2014 on charges of indecent treatment of a child, where he received 12 months’ jail. suspended for two years, and 18 months probation.

Defence lawyer James Benjamin said the breach through the use of dating apps may partly be explained by his client’s bipolar diagnosis and education history.

“His lack of education may explain a lack of complete understanding of the technologies that he was dealing with, and the sites and the services that he was using,” Mr Benjamin said.

“He had used either Facebook or Google as effectively his means of logging into these sites, and mistakenly thought that since police had his Google and Facebook login details already, they would know about his use of other services.”

Mr Benjamin said the nature of the services used by Skvaridlo did not suggest he’d attempted to have any contact with children.

“They are adult dating applications such as Plenty of Fish, which have age limitations involved,” he said.

Judge Nicole Kefford said she was satisfied the nature of the breaches were trivial in comparison to the original offence and concluded it would be unjust to activate the whole of the suspended sentence.

Judge Kefford extended the operational period of Skvaridlo’s suspended sentence by six months.