Young mum preyed upon by sick rapists in Brisbane City

A young mum was preyed upon in the middle of the Brisbane CBD by two men who had promised they were there to help her.

Shadrack Ndikuriyo outside the Supreme Court. Pic: John Gass

A young mother who sat on a park bench to get some air after a party was preyed upon by two men who said they would help her to an Uber but instead lured her to a secluded area of Brisbane’s Botanic Gardens and took turns raping her.

The brave victim was in the Brisbane District Court on Wednesday to see one of her attackers jailed for the “abhorrent, egregious and dehumanising” offending that occurred in the early hours of September 5, 2021.

The court heard Shadrack Ndikuriyo, then 39, and an 18-year-old co-offender promised to help the intoxicated 20-year-old woman but took her to a rotunda in the gardens and repeatedly raped her before taking her phone and leaving.

The pair later returned and asked for her banking password but she refused and took back her phone before a passer-by found her and took her to a hospital.

In a statement tendered to the court, the woman described how the “horrible and immoral” offenders had robbed her of a happy life and left her depressed, afraid to meet new people or leave her home, and suffering seizures from PTSD.

The woman said she needed to shower multiple times a day but still “always feels dirty” and like a shell of her former self.

“I’ll remember this for the rest of my life and it has undoubtedly changed my life,” she wrote.

“I’ll never be the same happy and bubbly person I once was.

“Instead I will always be afraid, sheltered and untrusting and it’s all thanks to (the attackers’) inability to have human decency.”

The younger offender was sentenced to eight years’ imprisonment in September.

Ndikuriyo, now aged 42, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to deprivation of liberty, attempted stealing and three counts of rape.

Judge Katherine McGinness sentenced him to eight-and-a-half years’ imprisonment and he will be eligible for parole after he has served half of that time in custody.

The court heard Ndikuriyo was born in the central African country of Burundi and he spent more than two decades in a Kenyan refugee camp before he came to live in Australia.

Defence barrister Sarah Cartledge said Ndikuriyo’s visa would inevitably be cancelled as a result of the convictions.

She said the father-of-three who had worked in a bakery for the past year instructed he had been drinking heavily on the night of the attack and could not recall details of the offending.

Annica Fritz, for the Crown, told the Brisbane District Court that while all rape cases were serious, this incident was a particularly “abhorrent, egregious and dehumanising” attack on a vulnerable young woman who had been grossly violated by the accused men.

Judge McGinness said the “brave young woman” had suffered significant emotional and psychological harm.

“The impact upon her has been substantial and devastating,” she said.

“Her life has permanently changed, she no longer feels safe.”

“She feels she will never be the same happy person she once was, rather she will always be afraid and untrusting thanks to your callous assaults upon her.”