Killer jailed for sex crimes

A murderer can now also be unmasked as a child sex abuser who robbed his young victim of her childhood.

David Noel Roigard was yesterday jailed for 3 1⁄2 years on five charges of indecent assault on a girl under 12, offending committed in the early 1980s in Taranaki.

He was found guilty of the charges following a jury trial in the Whanganui District Court last month. He was acquitted of another charge, which related to a different complainant.

During the trial, he was referred to as David Beamsley, as suppression orders were in place regarding the Roigard surname and the court proceedings connected to his murder trial, conviction and sentence. These were lifted by Judge Philip Crayton yesterday.

In February 2016, David Roigard was sentenced to life in prison, with a minimum nonparole period of 19 years, for murdering his son Aaron, along with eight charges of theft by a person in a special relationship.

Aaron Roigard, a father-of-two, was murdered on June 2, 2014, and is believed to be buried somewhere in rural South Taranaki. However, his body has never been found.

The motive for the crime put forward at the trial was that David Roigard murdered his son to cover up stealing more than $66,000 from him.

David Roigard has continued to deny his involvement in the crime and an appeal against his murder conviction and sentence is due to be heard by the Court of Appeal in July.

For the sexual offending, Roigard was 19 years old when he groomed and abused his 7-year-old victim.

At first, he touched her and the abuse, which lasted for about a year, became more serious as it went on.

The victim delivered a powerful statement to the court yesterday, which chronicled the pain and torment she had suffered for more than 30 tyears.

She spoke of how the abuse had ruined her childhood and robbed her of her potential.

‘‘My innocence as a little girl was taken away,’’ she said.

The court heard how David Roigard would threaten the young girl’s family as a means to silence her.