Convicted sex offender Noel Greenaway loses appeal against sentence

A former boss of Parramatta Girls School, who raped and terrified young women for years, has lost his appeal against his massive 82-year sentence.

A former boss of the draconian Parramatta Girls School who raped and terrified the young women for years had lost his appeal against his string of convictions and massive 82 years six month sentence.

Noel Greenaway, 84, who went on to abuse girls at the Ormond Training School, was told by the state’s highest court that he had targeted some of society’s most vulnerable young people, many of them wards of the state, and could have been jailed for life.

Noel Greenaway’s argument that he was unfairly treated has been thrown out on appeal. Picture: John Grainger

The Court of Criminal Appeal threw out his argument that he was unfairly treated because the sentence was “manifestly excessive”. The 82 years six months came down to 20 years with a non-parole period of 10 years as some will be served concurrently.

“The applicant’s crimes represent a very serious course of offending against some of society’s most vulnerable young people, committed by a person in authority, over an extended period,” appeal court judge Justice Helen Wilson said in the judgment handed down on Monday.

“Some of the offences carried a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.

“Such criminality demanded stern punishment, to address the wrong done, to make the applicant accountable, to denounce his conduct, and to deter others, principles of sentencing that applied in past decades as they do now.”

The dungeon at Parramatta Girls School around 1960.

The entrance to the Parramatta Girls School in 1960.

One of Greenaway’s victims was a pregnant 16-year-old who was beaten up by him in the Parramatta school’s notorious dungeon. Others told the court of anal rape.

The appeal court also rejected his appeal against his convictions in September 2019 by a jury’s majority verdict of 18 counts ranging from common assault contrary to rape and buggery on his five victims aged between 13 and 17.

After raping one 15-year-old girl, he told her to clean herself up because she was a “filthy pig”, the court heard.

He was relieving deputy superintendent at Parramatta Girls School between 1961 and 1967 and went on to become superintendent a Ormond Training School at Thorleigh where the appeal court said “he exercised ultimate authority”.

The Daily Telegraph reports the case in March 2014.

Noel Greenaway told one rape victim that she was a filthy pig. Picture: John Grainger

Also behind bars for raping and assaulting the young women is Frank Valentine, 80, the only other surviving boss from Parramatta school during one of the most shameful periods in the state’s recent history.

The Daily Telegraph tracked down both men after they were named at the child sex abuse royal commission.

Appealing against his convictions, Greenaway had argued the jury should not have heard so-called tendency evidence including evidence which did not involve his actual charges. That included that he was known as a “serial groper”.

He argued such evidence was prejudicial.

The CCA said that the tendency evidence included that the offences were committed on young female inmates at both institutions, they were committed in isolation and some were in the context of the inmate being punished and many of the acts were accompanied by coercive violence.

“There were a variety of sexual acts to gratify the applicant but many were repeated with different inmates,” the court said.

“Inmates were threatened or intimidated to ensure silence.”

The appeal court ruled that such tendency evidence was “probative” and not prejudicial in proving what happened.

At his sentencing, the District Court was told in 2019 that Greenaway’s life expectancy was about three years two months and within two years he would need the equivalent of nursing home care, which he could get in jail.