‘Beast’ jailed for historic rapes of girl and woman
Serial offender to appeal additional term for offences carried out in 80s and 90s
Stewart Murray Wilson has been jailed again for a series of historic rapes. The serial sex offender, dubbed “the Beast of Blenheim”, was found guilty by a jury last month of the historic rapes of a woman and a then 9-year-old girl and of trying to rape a third victim.
He was found not guilty of raping a fourth victim, the girl’s mother.
Wilson’s name, prior offending, and nickname had been suppressed until the verdicts were reached after a week-long trial in the High Court at Auckland.
He is now 71 years old. Yesterday, he was sentenced to a concurrent term of two years and four months’ imprisonment by Justice Graham Lang.
Wilson was known for drugging, assaulting and raping women over a 23-year period before he was caught.
He was sentenced in 1996 to 21 years’ imprisonment for sex and violence offences against women and girls, as well as charges of stupefying and bestiality.
Wilson’s counsel, Andrew McKenzie, yesterday argued there would have been no further uplift to Wilson’s sentence had his further offending been known in 1996.
He said no further term of imprisonment should be imposed on his client, who had now been in some form of detention for a quarter of a century.
Justice Lang said it would be “difficult to quantify” what sentence Wilson would have received had the new charges been laid in 1996.
However, he considered an increased term of imprisonment of two years and eight months “would not have been out of order with the overall gravity of the offending”.
He said even if he had reached a sentence of two years or less for the new offending he would not have imposed a sentence of home detention. Wilson’s offending also occurred prior to when the courts could impose a minimum period of imprisonment.
“A sentence of two years four months is hardly a deterrent to you or others but is only being imposed because of the 1996 sentence,” Lang said.
McKenzie said Wilson would appeal his convictions and sentence.
In 2012, Wilson was subjected to an extended supervision order and released with the most stringent conditions imposed on a New Zealander, including being paroled to a two-bedroom house which had been moved on to the Whanganui Prison grounds.
Police re-investigated Wilson in 2016 and accused him of raping three more women and a then girl in the 1970s and early 1980s in Wellington, Hamilton and Auckland.
He initially faced 16 charges, which were later amended at trial. Wilson was discharged on one count of stupefying, while one of the rape charges was altered to attempted rape.
The jury deliberated on six rape charges, three indecent assaults, three counts of indecency with a girl under 12, two charges of threatening to kill, one charge of attempted rape and one charge of burglary.
They returned unanimous guilty verdicts on 11 charges, one unanimous not guilty verdict, majority verdicts of not guilty on two charges, and were hung on two other charges.
Wilson was found not guilty of two rape counts and one charge of indecent assault. The jury was unable to reach verdicts on a charge of indecent assault and one count of threatening to kill.
He has never admitted any of his sexual offending.