Hussein El-Yassih: HR boss back behind bars after being found guilty of sexually assaulting woman

A western Sydney HR boss found guilty of sexually assaulting a woman, including pinning her against a wall and telling her to be a “good little girl”, has ended up behind bars ahead of his sentence.

HR boss Hussein El-Yassih.

A western Sydney HR boss found guilty of sexually assaulting a woman, including pinning her against a wall while masturbating, has ended up behind bars ahead of his sentence.

Hussein El-Yassih, of Greystanes, appeared at Sydney District Court on Monday where prosecutors applied for his detention after he was found guilty in a trial last month of three counts of aggravated sexually touching another person and one count of aggravated sexual act with another.

The 32-year-old had pleaded not guilty to all charges laid against him, and was acquitted by a jury of a number of sexual assault allegations.

The four charges he was found guilty of involved the same woman and occurred on two separate days in 2021.

Judge Jane Culver detailed the woman’s evidence with the first incident involving the pair going for a coffee and him “trying to pull her” into a fire escape at the QVB in the city.

Judge Culver said there was a “sense of persistence and struggle” by El-Yassih and it was “not just a fleeting sexual touching”.

“He was trying to kiss my neck, pull up on my skirt and just feed me compliments,” Judge Culver said, in detailing the woman’s evidence.

Sydney District Court. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Nikki Short

On the same day, the pair went up to a restaurant which was closed and Judge Culver said the woman explained how El-Yassih “kept trying to be … sexual with me [and] kept pressuring me to get a room”.

The court heard the woman said “no it’s not happening”.

However, El-Yassih tried to get his hand “up under” the woman’s skirt and she “would just wave [her] hand away”.

Judge Culver said El-Yassih pressed his penis on the woman from behind.

The court heard days later, he pinned the woman against a wall and tried to unbuckle her pants while telling her to “be quiet” and “be a good little girl”.

Judge Culver said El-Yassih unzipped his pants and the woman could feel his penis rubbing on her, but acknowledged there was still a dispute between the defence and crown about whether it was “skin to skin contact or not”.

During the “same episode”, Judge Culver said while El-Yassih had pinned her against the wall, he was saying “let me cum just once”.

“[He] flipped her around … pushed her body … face and front of her body … [into] the wall,” Judge Culver said.

“He was masturbating … begging her for a few more seconds … then ejaculated all over the wall next to her.”

His lawyer Abbas Soukie had earlier told the court it was “not inconceivable” that an intensive correction order, where his client could serve a jail sentence in the community, was “outside the sentencing range”.

He said the offences “did not involve a significant degree of planning”.

Before handing down her decision, Judge Culver noted El-Yassih’s struggles with mental illness and a submission that custody would be more onerous for him.

However, she found “based on the current material available”, El-Yassih would be sentenced to full-time jail and bail was ultimately refused.

He is due to be sentenced next month.