Victorian judge jails Nepalese man Anjan Shrestha for raping Facebook friend
EXCLUSIVE: AN ONLINE predator who raped a young woman after she accepted his Facebook friend request used her posts on the social media site to hunt her down.
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AN ONLINE predator used a young woman’s Facebook posts to hunt her down and rape her in a savage and shocking attack.
Facebook rapist Anjan Shrestha lay in wait as his unsuspecting victim partied at a nightclub with friends.
The Herald Sun can exclusively reveal that hours earlier the woman, aged in her early 20s, had detailed her clubbing plans online to her large number of Facebook friends, including Shrestha, whom she’d never met.
The woman posted a status update saying where she was going, with a photograph of what she was wearing, prompting more than 100 “likes” and comments.
Hours later, Shrestha drove to the nightclub in Berwick, which was then called Blitz, and sat waiting in his car, his headlights off, until the woman left about 2am.
He sat for about 30 minutes, watching as she went with friends to buy chips from a kebab shop. After her friends left her, he pounced. Shrestha called out, then pushed her to the ground, where he raped her, saying: “I’ve got you on Facebook.”
Afterwards, Shrestha changed his Facebook profile details.
Judge Geoff Chettle jailed Shrestha, 29, for six years with a minimum non-parole term of four years.
The rapist deserved more than a decade behind bars for the early morning attack on his helpless victim, the judge said. But his hands were tied by current sentencing practices grossly disconnected from the 25-year maximum penalty, he said.
Shrestha had pleaded not guilty to rape but was found guilty by a County Court jury.
Having come to Australia from Nepal in 2006, he faces likely deportation after serving his sentence. Shrestha has a partner here, and is expecting his first child, but Judge Chettle said: “In my view, it would be in the interests of the community if you were deported.”
A psychiatrist found Shrestha had a “sense of sexual entitlement”, and the court heard he had shown no remorse and had lied about his crime.
Shrestha told detectives he had been sitting outside the nightclub monitoring his girlfriend, whom he suspected of cheating on him.
He told them he had gone to his victim’s rescue after she fell, and they had engaged in consensual sexual activity.
Judge Chettle said: “You stalked, attacked and violated a young woman. You lied repeatedly about what occurred.
“You repeatedly falsely impugned the conduct of your victim. Your attack was premeditated, your victim was a stranger to you, the attack took place late at night in a secluded place. You attacked her when her hands were full and she was alone,” the judge said.
“You have demonstrated absolutely no remorse, and you represent a serious risk of reoffending.”
Attorney-General Martin Pakula said that early next year the State Government would introduce laws to ensure longer sentences for the dozen most serious crimes.
He said these would include a 10-year midpoint sentence for rape — 40 per cent of the 25-year maximum — and judges would have to give reasons for imposing a sentence above or below that “standard sentence”.
“These reforms will ensure that for the offence of rape, the stronger standard sentencing penalty of 10 years will override current sentencing practices,” Mr Pakula said.
“We want to make sure serious offenders receive consistent sentences which meet community expectations.”
Cyber Safety Solutions director Susan McLean said that crimes committed with the aid of technology were on the rise.
“This man has clearly formed quite an infatuation with (the victim) and decided for whatever reason she’d be easy picking,” she said.
While stressing that the victim was not to blame, she said: “You shouldn’t engage with people online that you don’t know. Having random people know your every move online is fraught with danger.
“There are people out there that use technology to facilitate the commission of crimes. You need to be super careful.”
JUDGE LASHES OUT: ‘GROSS DISCONNECT’ IN RAPE PENALTIES
THE senior judge who sentenced Facebook rapist Anjan Shrestha hit out on Wednesday at legal constraints on the jail tern he was able to impose.
Sentencing Shrestha for six years with a minimum non-parole term of four years, Judge Geoff Chettle told the rapist: “Given that parliament has set a maximum penalty of 25 years for the offence of rape, it’s hard to justify any penalty less than double figures.
“However, fortunately for you, current sentencing practices constrain the sentence this court can impose,” he said.
When considering what sentences to impose, judges are legally bound to take into account previous sentences imposed in like cases.
“I’m obliged to have regard to current sentencing practices in determining an appropriate sentence,” Judge Chettle told Shrestha.
“The Sentencing Act dictates that I must have regard to sentences imposed for comparable cases such as yours.”
Judge Chettle said: “It’s not for me to say that the range of sentences for like offending is too low.
“That’s for the Court of Appeal to make any such statements, and indeed on other occasions they have said so.
“Were it not for the limitations arising from the requirement to sentence you in accordance with current sentencing practices, I would have to consider a considerably higher sentence,” Judge Chettle told Shrestha.
“In my view, there is a gross disconnect between your offending and the maximum penalty and current sentencing practices.”
According to a recent statistical snapshot of Victorian sentences by the Sentencing Advisory Council, the median sentence being imposed for rape is five years’ jail.
Sentences imposed this year include:
A NON-custodial sentence for a teen who savagely raped a young woman so brutally she was left in hospital;
A SIX-year term for a man who, in 1989, raped a girl, 7, as she walked home from school, and;
A SADIST who raped his wife because she gave him the wrong socks saw his jail term cut on appeal