NT sporting star pleads guilty to grooming teenage girl
A mentor for young Territorians and a sporting star who persistently groomed a teenage girl over Instagram could face time in a cell, with a judge warning it was ‘serious offending’. Read the latest.
A Territory sporting star and mentor who had sex with a teenage girl after persistently grooming her over Instagram could face more time in a cell.
The man in his 30s — who cannot be named due to a suppression order — appeared in the Supreme Court on Friday to plead guilty to grooming and having sex with a teenager.
Justice Stephen Southwood heard that the Territory sporting figure was a mentor to young people when he started messaging the teenage girl on Instagram in order to groom her into having sex.
The court heard that while the teenager was above the legal age of consent due to how she knew the sports star she was “not able to consent”.
Prosecutor Neil Kumar said the sports star started talking to the teenager over Instagram, with the conversations starting innocuously.
“The conversation evolved from talking about sport to becoming more sexual and intimate in nature,” Mr Kumar said.
The courts have previously heard that investigators found more than 40 pages of Instagram messages between the athlete and the teenager.
Mr Kumar said one evening the sportstar asked the teenager to have sex with him, and they organised to meet up on a different day.
The court heard there two meetups followed a similar pattern, with the teenager going to a Palmerston location before being picked up by the well-known athlete.
On both occasions he drove a short distance away, before asking her to remove her pants and having sex with her inside the vehicle, before dropping off at the same location.
However on the second occasion he did not use a condom.
Defence lawyer Rebecca Kriesler said the sports star had written a letter of apology to his victim, as well as a letter from his counsellor to show how the notable athlete’s mental health had been impacted by media coverage.
But Justice Southwood questioned the relevance of the public interest in his sentencing decision.
“He as an adult... elects to engage in this criminal conduct on two occasions, knowing what would be the obvious ramifications of it,” he said.
“This, in my view, is serious offending.”
Following the guilty plea, Justice Southwood was about to revoke the sports star’s bail and send him to cell on remand before Ms Kriesler interjected.
Ms Kriesler said the sports star had already spent six days in prison, and she would be pushing for a fully suspended sentence.
Justice Southwood agreed to extend his bail until his sentencing hearing on Friday, December 12.
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Originally published as NT sporting star pleads guilty to grooming teenage girl
