Jarrad Pavric has convictions thrown out after ‘revenge porn’ charges

Convictions against the son of a serving police officer, initially found guilty of threatening a teen girl with ‘revenge porn’, have been thrown out.

Convictions against a young Horsley man initially found guilty of threatening to release ‘intimate’ selfies sent to him by a 14-year-old girl have been thrown out, with a judge finding the girl’s evidence was unreliable.

Jarrad Pavric, the son of a serving Illawarra police officer, was sentenced to 11 months in jail with a non-parole period of four months in June 2020, almost three years after he was charged under the state’s then-new ‘revenge porn’ laws.

Jarrad Pavric arrives at Wollongong Local Court in November 2020. Picture: Simon Bullard

Mr Pavric was found guilty of four charges in March 2020 after a three-day hearing, including two counts of threatening to distribute intimate content without consent, intentionally distributing images without consent and groom child for unlawful sexual activity.

During the hearing it was alleged he requested the 14-year-old girl send him ‘intimate’ images of herself during a two-to-three-week period in September 2017, before he allegedly threatened to publicly release her pictures if she didn’t give him “sexual favours”.

However, Mr Pavric’s legal team appealed the convictions in the NSW District Court, with Judge Penelope Wass allowing the appeal and quashing the convictions on Thursday.

Judge Wass found the girl’s evidence was at times “unconvincing” and “unreliable”.

“Her inconsistencies in her sworn evidence showed a willingness to tailor her evidence, a matter remarked upon by the learned magistrate as ‘not having a ring of truth’,” she said.

“Her evidence has not convinced me that she was an honest and reliable witness, including on matters critical to the Crown case.”

The convictions against Jarrad Pavric were quashed in the NSW District Court on September 30.

In her remarks, Judge Wass said Mr Pavric’s evidence was consistent with evidence presented at the hearing that he did not save her photos, which were sent via Snapchat.

“There is no evidence he saved her photos for later use, which would have been required for him to share them having received them only temporarily via Snapchat,” she said.

“The photos were not found on any of his devices as per his evidence.”

During the hearing, the girl told the court she sent the photos of herself to Mr Pavric after he sent photos of his penis to her, and that she blocked him after sending him her own images. Judge Wass on Thursday said the girl’s claim was “unbelievable”.

“If she sent the photos of herself in response, or at least after the appellant sent pictures to her, her decision to block him without anything further having occurred to explain it is inherently unbelievable and smacks of inversion,” she said.

Judge Wass also found the images the girl sent were not “intimate images” as per the legal definition, and that her age wouldn’t have known her age by looking at the photos.

“I have found there is no reliable evidence that (Mr Parvic) knew her to be only 14,” she said.