Boy released after rape

A 12-YEAR-OLD boy who raped an 11-year-old girl in Batchelor in 2019 while on bail and in breach of his curfew will be supervised “on a 24/7 basis” for the next 15 months.

The boy, who cannot be named, pleaded guilty in the Supreme Court to having sex with the underage girl after prosecutors conceded they could not prove he was aware she was not consenting at the time.

The court heard the boy was talking to the girl’s friend on Instagram and organised to meet up with her via her friend on August 25.

Later that night, the trio met up and when the girl’s friend left the others alone together, he started kissing her and touching her underneath her shirt before moving her onto the ground.

The girl started to resist by grabbing the boy’s wrists and pushing his hands away but he proceeded to have sex with her until he heard a relative calling out to him and got up and left, saying “If you get pregnant, don’t tell anyone what happened”.

Sentencing judge Stephen Southwood said the boy’s moral culpability was lessened by his age and immaturity, his “deprived and dysfunctional background” and his cognitive disabilities.

In setting an extensive list of conditions for the boy’s supervision on a suspended sentence, Justice Southwood said he was taking a “therapeutic approach” rather than one of “strict monitoring”.

“It is my experience that the supervision of youths often breaks down because those undertaking the supervision of the youth feel they do not have the power to ensure the youth’s compliance with basic behavioural norms,” he said.

“The purpose of the conditions I have imposed is to give his community youth justice officer that power, and I expect the youth’s community youth justice officer to exercise that power appropriately.”