Named and shamed: Victorians caught with child abuse material
From former restaurant managers to teachers, firefighters and parents — these are the Victorians caught with horrific material depicting the sexual abuse of innocent children. FULL REPORT.
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A record number of Australians have been caught with vile child abuse material, with Victoria home to some of the most vile and repugnant offenders.
This year Australia’s eSafety Commissioner Julie Grant received a record 14,494 complaints about child sexual abuse material.
“This was also a record – and not one we want to see broken,” she wrote in her annual report.
“We continue to work with our local and international partners to remove this content from the internet and help bring some sense of relief to victims.”
Police also have seen a 44 per cent uptick in charges laid.
Over the past year, the Joint Anti Child Exploitation Team laid 1541 charges relating to grooming children online and the possession and transmission of child abuse material.
Victorian courts have seen high-ranking government employees to teachers, firefighters and even parents sentenced for their sick crimes.
Here are some of the worst offenders convicted in Victoria in the past two years.
Wayne Harper, 59.
The former prison boss was jailed in November 2020 after his sickening collection of child abuse material was found when he sold his family home in Geelong.
The new owner was renovating in August 2019 when he discovered multiple USB sticks discarded in a wardrobe, which contained both official prison documents and child abuse material.
Police raided the former general manager of Margoneet’s home and office, uncovering evidence he’d been accessing the material for at least four years.
Sentencing Harper to a minimum term of two years and three months, Judge Patricia Riddell said his crimes were particularly serious given his position in the state’s correctional system.
“The community is also entitled to expect that a person in a role of prison manager would have some understanding and concern for victims of crime,” she said.
Andrew Harris, 48.
The former Metro Trains ticket inspector and part-time Parkenham CFA lieutenant was jailed for six months in 2020 after he was busted uploading child abuse material to Tumblr.
His home was raided by the Australian Federal Police in June the previous year, which uncovered an iPad containing 69 images and 170 videos of horrific material.
The device’s search history also included searches for naked children performing sex acts and incest, as well as tips for how to adopt children from Thailand and conceal his online activity.
He is currently serving a two-year community corrections order after his release from prison in late 2020.
Aaron Barnden, 44.
The renowned violinist, who previously performed with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, was jailed for two months in October 2020 for producing and possessing child exploitation material.
Barnden was nabbed by the Australian Federal Police in a raid on his Blackburn home in September the previous year where investigators seized devices containing 319 vile images.
Police also discovered the children’s music tutor had created his own child abuse material by photoshopping underage children onto pornographic images.
He was placed on a two-year community corrections order after his release from prison and made a registered sex offender for 15 years.
Timothy Patrick Cordova, 27.
The Victorian teacher created a fake online persona under the name “Matilda Roberts” to communicate with dozens of former and current male students of St Mark’s Primary Catholic School, soliciting child exploitation material.
His Rowville home was raided by detectives from the Joint Anti-child Exploitation team in June last year, seizing computers and hard drives.
An analysis of the electronic devices uncovered sick pictures and videos in hidden folders, some using the full names of schoolchildren – allowing police to easily identify victims.
Yearbook headshots of students superimposed on child exploitation material were also found.
Daniel Pisano, 35.
The former manager at one of Melbourne’s most popular Lebanese restaurants was jailed last year after police uncovered 24,000 images and videos of disgusting child exploitation material on his electronic devices.
In the year prior to his arrest in February 2020, the Greenvale man had posed as a teenager on KiK and WhatsApp, grooming underage victims to share images and videos of themselves.
Police found evidence the Sheesh Grill manager was also part of a ring that shared child exploitation material via Dropbox.
He was granted bail but police were back at his house three months later after the serial offender was caught with more sick material.
Pisano was sentenced in October to a minimum of four years and nine months jail after pleading guilty to 37 offences.
Judge Scott Johns said he had committed “deeply troubling” offending by participating in the trafficking of vile child abuse material.
“By extension you are part of the vile trade and exploitation of defenceless children,” he said.
Gareth Dunstan, 55.
The Mt Waverley dad was jailed in October last year for six months after police discovered a hoard of 6036 images and videos of child abuse material at his home.
Gareth Dunstan landed on the police radar after his credit cards were linked to a membership for an online site which specialised in the sickening material, purchasing from the website on seven occasions over a four year period.
Under questioning, the former data analyst admitted to downloading child exploitation material but told police he would: “Exercise his judgment to select girls who looked more like women”.
“The reason general deterrence is important is because he’s feeding the market with the production of this material,” Judge Kevin Doyle said in his sentencing remarks.
He was made a registered sex offender for eight years.
Justin Gorniakowski, 48.
The “wicked” Hoppers Crossing stay-at-home dad was jailed in June for his role in a sick ring which shared child exploitation material with other users on encrypted messaging app Telegram.
Justin Gorniakowski was arrested in July last year after police uncovered the ring, learning he had “made available” more than 100 files to other users.
His phone was seized, which was found to contain 366 images and videos, and a further 4000 were discovered in an online account.
Some of the vile material seized by police depicted children as young as six months old.
Judge Douglas Trapnell said Gorniakowski fuelled child abuse market with his “appalling wicked, and depraved material”.
He was jailed for three years but will be released onto an 18-month good behaviour bond after serving 18 months, and was made a registered sex offender for 15 years.
Blake Dillon, 20.
The aspiring graphic designer from Narre Warren South was nabbed by police after downloading horrific child exploitation material to “explore his sexuality”.
Blake Dillon was arrested in June last year with investigators seizing 1777 images and 25 hours of disturbing video footage, including some depicting sadism and bestiality.
Dillon told police he first downloaded child abuse material when he was about 14 years old, initially looking at kids his own age but then seeking out younger children.
“Eventually I found myself going to the dark web to find more videos … (and) eventually it became a bit of a habit,” he said.
“There’s nothing I can really say to defend myself beyond that I was an idiot teenager.”
He was sentenced to a two-year community corrections order in March this year and will be placed on the sex offenders’ register for eight years.
Daffyd Knox, 57
The Echuca disability support worker’s home was raided by police after his laptop was used to access child exploitation material online, with police finding 361 images saved to the device.
He blamed pop-up ads on a porn website and a compulsion to save everything for downloading the horrid images.
“I definitely knew having that stuff was illegal,” he told police.
Knox pleaded guilty to possessing the disturbing content in March this year and was placed on the sex offenders register for eight years.
Long Ngoc Huynh, 43
The Meadow Heights father-of-two blamed boredom as the reason he began watching sexualised videos of young girls on the family computer.
Police raided Long Ngoc Huynh’s home in 2019, finding a stash of more than 30 hours of videos of child exploitation downloaded from the dark web.
In an interview with police, Huynh admitted to looking at the videos “out of curiosity” and because he was “bored”.
He was spared jail by Magistrate Olivia Trumble in November this year who said he didn’t have a collection of “thousands” of illegal videos as offenders often do.
He was fined $5000 and placed on the sex offender registry.
Andrew O’Halloran, 37
The Grovendale man was caught in an undercover sting after describing depraved sexual fantasies with children to a police officer online in 2019.
Andrew O’Halloran began talking to “Tara” before moving his attention to her fictitious nine-year-old daughter, even suggesting he have sex with her for “educational purposes”.
He was arrested in April 2020 when police raided the home he lived at with his father and stepmother, with police seizing more than 30,000 files of nudist colony photos and videos featuring young girls.
In sentencing, Judge Frank Gucciardo said O’Halloran’s behaviour was “repugnant”.
“The transmission of material … in form of conversation and text are undoubtedly deplorable,” he said.
He was sentenced in August to a minimum term of 12 months imprisonment.
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