10 of Bendigo’s worst sex offenders convicted in 2024 exposed
Teachers, local business owners and family men — 10 of the worst sex predators hiding in the Bendigo community have been exposed. See the list.
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Teachers, local business owners and family men; sexual predators hiding in the Bendigo community have been exposed.
Here’s a list of 10 sex criminals convicted at Bendigo Magistrates’ and County courts in 2024.
Sonny Middleton
A vile Bendigo businessman and father of four has been exposed for sexually assaulting a teenage girl.
Sonny Middleton, 38, of White Hills, pleaded guilty and was jailed for sexually assaulting a teenage girl at a party in August 2023.
The girl told police she woke up with Middleton leaning over her with his hand down her pants.
Middleton fled the scene when she shouted for help, leaving the traumatised teenager weeping with her pants pulled down.
Middleton is part owner of Middleton Motors, a “well-known” Heathcote car dealership business that he is partners in with his brother and father.
Police initially alleged Middleton raped the teen by penetrating her with his finger, but his lawyers successfully argued there was insufficient evidence to convict Middleton on the rape charge and the charge was withdrawn.
Middleton was jailed for six months, with 77 days reckoned as time served in pre-sentence custody followed by a 12 month community corrections order.
Bryan Russell Keely
A Bendigo PE teacher who repeatedly had sex with a teenage girl he called his “girlfriend” told her it was his “dream” to live with her and watch their children run around.
Disgraced teacher Bryan Russell Keely, 36, was jailed for six years and eight months with a non parole period of four years for the vile grooming and rape of a 15-year-old girl.
The Spring Gully man was arrested at a Bendigo school on August 28 last year after a teenage girl told police she had been in a “sexual relationship” with Keely for a number of months.
He was released on bail the next day and ordered to not go within 20m of the teenager or contact children using social media.
The teacher then used his mother’s iPad to groom the same child on Snapchat and possessed child abuse material of her, telling her he wanted to “touch” her “again”.
“I love you baby so much it hurts me wishing you a (sic) amazing sleep and dreams of us living together in our own home with our kids running around laughing. Your (sic) my beautiful angel love u from the deepest part of my heart xx,” the accused allegedly wrote.
Between May and August 2023, Russell-Keely repeatedly picked the victim up in his car at night and had sex with her in bushland and at his home, with the teacher filming the intercourse on several occasions.
Keely’s victim said in a statement that she felt “intense feelings of shame and sadness”.
Judge Fiona Todd said Keely deluded himself into thinking he was in a loving “relationship” with the child and lacked insight into his offending.
Keely was placed on the sex offender registry for life and will never teach again.
Howard Bruce Armstrong
An ex-Koori education officer who worked with kids in Central Victorian schools has been brought down for the “degrading” molestation of a teenage boy and showing him “horse porn”.
Howard Bruce Armstrong, 59, of Echuca was jailed for abusing a position of trust to sexually assault a teenager in a “humiliating” and “degrading” “pattern of offending”.
Armstrong exhibited “grooming behaviour” when he started to show the victim bestiality – “horse porn” – and talk to him “about sex in detail”.
Armstrong then sexually assaulted the teenage boy on multiple occasions, cornering the child and forcing his hand into his shorts, grabbing his penis and masturbating him before telling the child: “don’t tell anyone”.
The victim told police he “froze” while thinking “please don’t, please just stop”.
Armstrong later exposed himself to the child, “pleading” with the victim to engage in sexual acts.
The court heard Armstrong had traumatised the victim, impacting his education and leaving him with flashbacks of the disgusting exploitation, leaving him feeling trapped and fearful he would run into Armstrong.
Armstrong was sentenced to four months in prison followed by an 18 month community corrections order to begin upon his release.
Patrick Mathews
A sex fiend whose pedo chat group moniker was “under 18 only” has been exposed secretly filming two young girls in the shower.
Patrick Mathews, 51, of Maryborough, was jailed for two years with 14 months non-parole after pleading guilty producing child abuse material.
Police raided Mathews’ home and workplace in Maryborough after an investigation found he was part of a pedophile chatgroup that shared child sexual exploitation videos.
Police seized Mathews’ phone and found he had been filming two young girls in the shower for a number of months in 2022.
The grub was then busted again in June and July of 2023 possessing disgusting videos of child sexual exploitation.
Judge Amanda Chambers described Mathews’ “appalling predatory behaviour” as an “egregious breach of trust” that had left a “devastating impact” on “every aspect” of his victims’ lives.
Bradley Watson
A vile Goulburn Valley netball coach stalked teenage girls and harassed them with “sleazy” messages and sexually explicit pictures for more than a year while his victims lived in fear he would “take” them.
Bradley Watson, 45, was jailed for six months for stalking and sexually harassing multiple teenage girls, leaving them terrified.
Watson was a prominent and respected member of the small Goulburn Valley town where he lives, running a small business with his parents.
Between 2015 and 2021, Watson was a volunteer coach at the local football and netball club, during which time he stalked and sexually harassed five teenage girls using fake social media accounts.
It was revealed Watson tried to groom the teens to send him sexual images and engage in sexual acts, asking one girl to meet him in a public toilet.
Watson took pictures of the girls at local sporting events, sending them to his victims via fake social media accounts, commenting on what they were wearing and describing their family homes.
Watson persistently harassed the teens, telling one girl he was “her secret admirer” and “he had seen her sexy a--e around and its so hot”, telling her he “hoped he dreamt about her”.
The victims said in statements to the court that Watson’s campaign for sexual gratification had left them terrified and traumatised.
One victim’s mother said she felt “helpless to stop the harassment”.
The victims’ parents said they were fearful for their children’s safety when they were at school and work while Watson was on bail, and angry they were forced to avoid him while the grub was on bail in the community.
One of his victims said it made her “skin crawl” that a person she “trusted” could hurt her in such a sick way.
“(A man) who cooked snags on the barbecue at … events … I feel like I could throw up,” she said.
Rodney Stuart Bamblett
A sadistic Echuca thug has been exposed using a shotgun to rape a “terrified” woman, and making another “bow down to him” and kneel on broken glass.
Rodney Stuart Bamblett, 33, also known as Rodney Morgan, was jailed for 14 years with a non-parole period of nine years after a jury found him guilty at trial in September 2023 on three charges of rape.
In January 2020 Bamblett pointed an unloaded double barrel shotgun at the face of a woman and pulled the trigger, laughing when she became distressed.
Later in February, he took the woman to a wooded area near the Murray River near Echuca, retrieved a double barrel shotgun and loaded it in front of the victim.
“Do you think anyone would hear if I let some shots off out here?” Bamblett asked his “terrified” victim.
“I think if anyone got killed out here, I don’t reckon they would be found.”
When the victim saw headlights in the distance, she “prayed” that someone would come and help her, the court heard.
Bamblett was also sentenced in February for the brutal baseball bat bashing and humiliation of another woman.
The sadistic brute forced the woman to pick up a glass bottle of alcohol and smashed her in the wrist, breaking the bottle and causing a laceration to her arm which started bleeding.
Bamblett then told her to “bow down to him”.
Terrified, the victim knelt, cutting her knees on the glass on the floor.
Ryan Tovey
A Heathcote man told police he “fell in love” with a teenager he groomed after he was exposed using his position of power to take “emotional hold” of his victim.
Ryan Tovey, 33, groomed the child over more than 13,000 messages which showed “a clear knowledge of power imbalance, grooming and manipulation”, with Tovey coercing the child to send him sexually explicit images of herself.
Tovey took “emotional hold” over the child as he steadily steered the conversations towards a sexual nature while talking to her from morning to night for six months.
His insidious groomed caused “issues between herself and family”, and distracted her from “high school, career aspirations and mental wellbeing”.
The child’s mother became concerned about the “relationship” when the child started to become withdrawn from her family, discovering Tovey was “sexting” her daughter, describing sexual acts he wanted to perform on her.
After the grub was exposed and charged for his grooming, he was bailed on the condition he not contact the teenager again.
But just weeks later Tovey was back contacting the child again in breach of his bail.
Tovey took out a new phone number to do so undetected, “persistently” contacting the child with multiple texts and a five hour phone call made over almost three weeks before the pedo was arrested again.
Tovey was sentenced to a 24-month community corrections order for his “manipulation” and grooming of the child after spending 40 days in pre-sentence custody for breaching bail.
Phillip Crosley Howie
A pedo has been exposed taking pictures of little kids in Bendigo before sharing the images with a Facebook pedo group and trying to get sex dolls based on their photos.
Phillip Crosley Howie, 60, pleaded guilty to producing and distributing child abuse material after he was exposed stalking and covertly photographing kids around Bendigo.
Howie took multiple photos of pre-pubescent children at the Bendigo Show Grounds, a medical clinic waiting room and Lansell Square in Kangaroo Flat.
During a raid on the pedo’s house, police uncovered that Howie participated in an online pedophile group on Facebook where he spoke to other pedos and distributed an image of a child he took in Kangaroo Flat at Lansell Square.
“She got her legs wide open sitting on the floor,” he wrote.
He also tried to order a sex doll of one of the pre-pubescent girls that he photographed.
The court heard Howie had left his phone number on the wall of a Bendigo public toilet which resulted in sexualised conversations about child abuse with another grub.
In one message Howie had made a “promise” to bring children to the unknown male, the court heard.
Police uncovered a text conversation where Howie had discussed taking an 11-year-old girl from Kangaroo Flat and giving her to a man for sexual acts.
They also discussed abducting one of the pre-pubescent girls he had photographed so they could sexually abuse her.
Magistrate Trieu Huynh said Howie would be jailed with a non-parole period, but delayed sentence for further psychological assessments to help determine an appropriate sentence.
Howie has been remanded in custody since his arrest and will return to court in February 2025.
Raymond Leslie Dean
A vile Bendigo sex offender with a history of vile acts who preyed on a young girl showed no remorse for a sexual assault on a young girl that left her bleeding.
Raymond Leslie Dean, 61, pleaded guilty to a historic sexual assault of a child at Eaglehawk in 2007.
The victim woke to Dean lifting up her nightie to her stomach after he crept into her room as she slept.
She wasn’t wearing underwear and Dean had his face and hands between her legs, the court heard.
She told police she could “feel his breath” which caused her to scream and kick him in the head.
Dean told her “it’s OK, OK, please don’t tell anyone”.
When she went to the toilet and urinated and felt burning, and there was bleeding.
The prosecution said Dean showed no remorse for preying on the child, claiming it was “a load of bulls--t”, and had only pleaded guilty out of convenience.
The court heard Dean had a long history of sexual offending and had been placed on the sex offenders’ registry for life for his evil acts.
Dean was convicted and sentenced to a suspended jail sentence of six months suspended for two years.
Paul Showell
A Bendigo man tried to explain his “atrocious” sexual offences towards a child by a perceived lack of affection in his marriage.
Paul Showell, 56, pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a teenage girl on multiple occasions between 2013 and 2018, and possessing child abuse material.
Showell said he committed the acts as a “substitute” for a marriage in which he “wasn’t feeling the love”.
The court heard he showed some remorse, but that his explanations for the crimes were “ludicrous” and “unfathomable”.
Showell was sentenced to six months jail followed by an 18-month community correction order.
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