Victim speaks out after paramedic pleads guilty to child sexual abuse

A young man who was sexually abused by a paramedic and pillar of the community has detailed the trauma of being labelled a liar and forced out of his home town. Shane Rose, now 20, wore a wire to confront his abuser as part of an undercover police sting.

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There were those who didn’t want to believe Bourke teenager Shane Rose when he alleged his foster father, a widely respected paramedic and businessman regarded as a pillar of the outback town, had sexually abused him for years.

Mr Rose wore a hidden recording device and got Ronald Willoughby to confess to being a paedophile, then stayed strong while some in the divided community turned on the young man. He felt forced to leave town.

Mr Rose was a young boy with ambition from a disadvantaged background.

Shane Rose was sexually abused by senior paramedic Ronald Willoughby when he lived in Bourke as a child. Picture: David Swift

Ronald Willoughby was Bourke Ambulance Station supervisor, owned a local supermarket and the butchery and was named Rotary Club’s citizen of the year in 2014.

Mr Rose, now 20, had first met Willoughby as a pre-teen while in the care of Family and Community Services.

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He was determined to finish high school and was a star swimmer at the Bourke pool, where he was introduced to Willoughby.

Willoughby gave him a job at the supermarket, set him up with a tax file number and a mobile phone.

“He seemed like a great guy and was very interested in seeing how far I could go with schooling,” Mr Rose told The Sunday Telegraph.

“He wanted me to achieve whatever I wanted to.

“He just did so many things for me and I felt at the time I never met a person like him.”

Shane Rose pictured with his foster carer Ronald Willoughby, who pleaded guilty to indecent assault and aggravated sexual assault.

In 2013, Willoughby, whose wife was living in Gunnedah, became a foster carer to Mr Rose. It put a wedge between Mr Rose and his family, who thought he was being taken away from his Aboriginal culture.

“I didn’t want to upset anyone,” he said.

“At the time I was focusing on my wellbeing and who was there at the time and did more for me and the best person to stay with.”

It was with the benefit of hindsight that Mr Rose recognised Willoughby came into his life at a time of extreme vulnerability.

The young man dreamt of studying criminology at university and was desperate to leave Bourke. Willoughby was his ticket out.

Ronald Willoughby, now aged 63, was considered a pillar of the Bourke community.

“He said he would be there to see me through until I completed HSC, university and doing whatever I wanted to do,” Mr Rose said.

While working at the SPAR supermarket, Willoughby took Mr Rose back to his house one day under the guise of fixing him something to eat and drink. He sexually assaulted him on the lounge room floor.

During a stay at a motel in Dubbo, ­Willoughby also assaulted Mr Rose in the bathtub and in the motel room.

Back home in Bourke, where Mr Rose ­returned to finish high school, occasionally he’d wake up in the middle of the night to find Willoughby sitting in his bedroom.

Willoughby claimed he was a bad sleepwalker but that didn’t explain the pornographic video he played on Mr Rose’s TV.

The abuse drove Mr Rose to the brink of suicide and in July 2017 he sat down with Child Abuse Squad detectives, agreeing to wear a wire and confront his abuser at his home.

“(Willoughby) said ‘I am sorry that it ­happened and I would take it back if I could’,” Mr Rose said.

“I thought, he isn’t remorseful, he is not sincere, he is just saying it to save his own back and I thought no, I am not doing that.”

Five days after Mr Rose’s statement to police, Willoughby was charged with indecent assault and aggravated sexual assault of a person under 16.

Shane Rose said he felt shunned by the town of Bourke after speaking out against Ronald Willoughby.

Now 63, he is facing a lengthy jail term after he pleaded guilty in October to sexually assaulting Mr Rose when he was a foster child in his care. A suppression order was lifted in Sydney’s District Court last week.

Mr Rose can’t forget the hostile stares from locals as he walked through Bourke after ­Willoughby’s arrest.

“He was such a highly respected person and chief of paramedics, someone who got citizen of the year, he was kind to everyone,” Mr Rose said.

“No one believed me. It was very hard ­living there and I also lost a lot of friends … That’s why I left. I wasn’t welcome anymore.”

Once Willoughby is sentenced in June, Mr Rose, who now lives in Sydney, is looking forward to putting the case behind him to return to his goal of studying at university.

Mr Rose credits his late mother, who died when he was 12, as the source of his resilience and his extended family for their unwavering support.

“They have always had my back from day one,” he said.

NSW Ambulance suspended Willoughby, who is in custody, when he was charged and he no longer works as a paramedic.