Life in prison sentences for man, woman who carried out 234 child sex crimes in five years

A Queensland couple’s offending has been described by a judge as five times worse than a convicted paedophile jailed for shocking abuse in Thailand. The man and woman faced more than 250 charges. PICTURE: GRAPHIC CONTENT

**WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT**

A central Queensland mother has been jailed for life after offering up her four-year-old daughter to be repeatedly raped by a man in what's been described as one of the most 'horrendous' child sex crimes in the state, the detail of which was so horrific it left courtroom witnesses sobbing.

The woman, 40, and the man, 36, who was already sexually abusing his sons and niece, pleaded guilty in the Supreme Court in Rockhampton this week to more than 250 charges for 234 crimes.

Of the counts, 207 involved the woman’s daughter carried out over a 16-month period.

The case was described by Crown prosecutor Joshua Phillips as “the most depraved sex abuse the Queensland community has ever known”.

Mr Phillips said the facts of the pair’s offending filled 40 A4 pages with a 23-page executive summary and a USB of the videos which have been placed in an envelope never to be opened unless by court order.

The sick, vile, grotesque, horrendous, violent child sex acts were read out to the court by Justice Graeme Crow, who described the case as “monumental” and “horrendous” during sentencing with even the most senior and experienced legal industry professionals displaying signs of distress at the contents.

People in the gallery sobbed as the facts were read out.

The depraved acts on the child - including how she cried out for help while being raped - were detailed in court but are too graphic to publish.

The facts included five children aged four to 12 being restrained and raped.

During the investigation, police located a laptop and mobile phone which contained more than 2500 images and 1027 videos of child porn.

A video, 11 minutes and 16 seconds long depicting a snippet of the vile sickening acts of two child sex offenders, who accumulated more than 10 hours of footage of their crimes, was played to Justice Crow.

Assisting crown prosecutor Tiffany Lawrence said there were “no truly comparable cases” in Queensland.

She said they predominantly carried out penetrating acts on their victims and extensively recorded them which “immortalised their cruelty displayed to their victims”.

Both were handed life in prison sentences – only the second occasion in Queensland in the past 20 years. If ever released, they would be subject to parole for the rest of their lives.

A man believed to be related to the male offender told him to “go rot” as court concluded.

THE HISTORY AND FACTS OF THE OFFENDING

The pair met on Tinder in November 2017 and the woman would stay with the man when her electricity was turned off due to non-payment – she was spending all of her money on her addiction to methamphetamines.

The man, who could drink a bottle of spirits per night and was using meth daily during the offending period, starting abusing his victims in September 2014.

During a sleepover, he raped his six-year-old niece.

The next day, after making threats to her if she told anyone, he filmed himself sexually assaulting the girl and forced her to make sexual comments at the camera.

One of the man’s sons told police he once saw a video on his father’s phone of his stepsister being abused.

The man sexually abused this son and another son. One of the sons was subjected to 25 months of sexual abuse at the hands of his father.

When the woman became involved, she helped the man abuse her daughter. In a three hour recorded ordeal, the child was raped three times.

In another protracted event, where the child was raped 14 times and assaulted eight times, the child was clearly distressed - screaming and calling out for her mother to help.

The child continued crying and after the event, the mother hugged her and said “that was beautiful baby”.

There were more protracted recorded attacks on that child over the offending period, including one where she was raped 15 times and another which featured an unknown male offender.

Justice Crow said the man became increasingly aggressive towards the girl over time.

“How is she not a paedophile?”

Justice Graeme Crow described the pair’s offending as being five times worse than convicted Queensland paedophile Jason Daron Milner who spent years in a Thailand prison for raping two children – one of which spent three months in hospital due to their injuries – and was then sentenced in Queensland for grooming and sexually abusing a two-year-old girl and filming the assaults.

The female offender’s defence barrister Tony Arnold argued there was no evidence his client was a paedophile.

Justice Crow argued, having seen the video evidence and transcripts, along with knowing she offered up her five-year-old daughter for the male to repeatedly assault, “how is she not a paedophile? Or was she just a paedophile for her daughter?”

Mr Arnold argued the male started his offending five years before being charged, far longer than his client who started up “a very odd” relationship with the male.

Justice Crow said a psychologist report he deemed conflicting indicated the female victim was remorseful, but also placed blame on the male victim and her methamphetamine addiction.

The male’s defence barrister Andrew Hoare said his client did not “blame the ice or anyone else” for his offending, nor was he using the abuse he suffered earlier in life as an excuse for his offending.

The offending came to light when a friend of the woman witnessed the four-year-old’s reaction to being told she was going to the man’s house.

The friend, when they got the child alone, asked why she didn’t like the man and the child told them the man hurt her.

The man’s initial response to police was: “In this f---ing house? There better not be. What the f---? I raised the kid as my own. This is unreal.”

The woman’s initial response to police was that she hoped “to God” they were wrong before saying either of her two sons could have been responsible.

She continually denied any involvement.

The court heard a psychologist report spanning 17-pages never diagnosed the woman, who claimed she was gang raped when she was 15, with any mental health disorders and that she was remorseful for her offending, but placed some blame on the man and her drug addiction.

The male’s charges included one count of maintaining a sexual relationship with a child, one of maintaining a sexual relationship with a child (domestic violence offence), 85 counts of rape, four counts of rape (domestic violence), 14 attempted rapes, 25 counts of making child porn, one count of distributing child porn, 34 common assaults and dozens of indecent treatment of children charges involving filming, grooming, forcing them to perform sexual acts on the offender.

The female’s charges included 58 rapes (domestic violence), eight attempted rapes, one maintaining a sexual relationship with a child, 29 varying counts of indecent treatment of a child, 20 counts of making child porn and 26 common assaults (domestic violence).

“Saying what occurred is much easier than watching what happened to this (female) child,” Justice Crow said.

Originally published as Life in prison sentences for man, woman who carried out 234 child sex crimes in five years