Desensitised and disassociated: Woman jailed for keeping daughter’s sexual abuse a secret

A woman has been brought before court after failing to tell police her boyfriend spent years sexually abusing her young daughter. What the court heard >

A woman has been jailed for failing to report the abuse of her daughter to police.

A woman will spend six months in jail after failing to tell police her boyfriend was sexually abusing her young daughter.

The Supreme Court of Tasmania heard the woman, whose name has not been released, had been “overborne” by her emotionally-abusive partner and had since been an inpatient at a mental health clinic.

However, Chief Justice Alan Blow found it was a “very serious case”, with her crime an extremely serious breach of trust between a mother and a “very vulnerable” child.

He said the woman’s partner had seriously sexually abused the girl for four-and-a-half years, when the child was aged between seven and 11, and sometimes photographed her.

“The abuse was ongoing and frequent, occurring almost daily,” Chief Justice Blow said.

“It is clear that (the woman) knew about the abuse from a fairly early stage.

“She was present on other occasions when abuse took place, including times when her partner took photographs or made videos. On some occasions she took photos of her daughter at the man’s request. Her daughter told her of the abuse.”

The judge said the woman had a history of depression and low self-esteem, with a strong desire to please her partner and a “desire to avoid his disapproval or displeasure”.

“He was emotionally abusive and controlling through most of their seven-year relationship, consistently telling her that she was not good enough and that she was a bad mother. There was some physical violence,” he said.

A psychologist said she had likely become desensitised to the “increasingly inappropriate and harmful nature of her partner’s requests”, to the point where her fears affected her capacity to care for and protect her daughter.

“The psychologist suggested that she had disassociated from the logical and emotional processes necessary to empathise with the impact of the sexual acts on her daughter,” Chief Justice Blow said.

“She now acknowledges that she has permanently damaged the relationship with her children, that they may never be returned to her care, that they may reject her when they understand the seriousness of the abuse and her betrayal, and that she now experiences feelings of shame and remorse.”

The woman, who pleaded guilty to one count of failing to report the abuse of a child, was given a one-year jail sentence, with a non-parole period of six months.

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Originally published as Desensitised and disassociated: Woman jailed for keeping daughter’s sexual abuse a secret