Deviant guilty of assault

Liked to ‘steal cuddles’

AN opportunistic deviant with a penchant for vulnerable young women has been found guilty of the in decent assault of a young, intellectually disabled woman in northern Tasmania.

Ashley William Baverstock, 57, pleaded not guilty to three counts of indecent assault and one count of aggravated sexual assault in the Supreme Court in Launceston.

A jury on Thursday found him guilty of two indecent assaults against the woman: one at Launceston Library and one at her unit in a monitored care complex the same day.

Baverstock was found not guilty of two other charges.

The court heard he approached the woman in the library in May 2017 and spoke with her briefly before rubbing her breasts and vagina.

He denied the allegation to police saying he gave her a cuddle and would often “steal cuddles” from people at the library. Baverstock told the officers he had learnt to keep his hands to himself because he had “been through all of this before”.

The court heard he went to the woman’ s house at 8 pm that night. The jury found Baverstock touched and pinched the woman’s breasts and vagina before leaving the unit, but was not guilty of further assault allegations.

Baverstock told police the woman had invited him to her home, but she told the court under cross examination that was a lie.

The court heard the offender knew where she lived because they had met at the complex before.

The woman’s psychologist Carly Edmunds told the court her client’s disability caused her difficulty understanding relationships and emotions.

Crown prosecutor Virginia Jones said Baverstock’s criminal history included “all manner of offending” across four states from 1983. He was convicted of touching the breasts of two teenagers on separate occasions at another Tasmanian library in 2005.

He was convicted of wilful and obscene exposure in Victoria in 1997 and committing an indecent act with a child and stalking in 1999.

Defence lawyer Patrick O’Halloran will seek a Centrelink document to prove his client was approved for a disability pension due to a psychological condition before sentencing. Justice Robert Pearce said a prison sentence was likely and sought a presentence report. Baverstock was remanded in custody to appear on December 3.