by Cam Lucadou-Wells
A serial family-violence offender has been jailed after breaking into his wife’s home in Officer and sexually assaulting her in her bedroom.
The 39-year-old Pakenham father of three, who Star News has chosen not to name to protect his victim’s identity, pled guilty at the Victorian County Court to sexual assault, unlawful assault and persistently contravening a family-violence intervention order.
At the time of the assault, the man was subject to a community corrections order for previously threatening to kill the wife and children.
He was also subject to a family violence intervention order that banned him from contacting the family at the time, and a good-behaviour bond for breaching the same order.
About 10 weeks before the attack, he’d been summonsed to Dandenong Magistrates’ Court for breaching the order.
After that hearing, he falsely told the victim that the order was finalised and he was allowed to see the children.
During the attack on 11 June 2023, the man sneaked into the home through the garage.
He stood next to the victim’s bed as she emerged from showering in her en-suite bathroom.
Despite her requests for him to leave, the man locked the bedroom door, pushed her on the bed and attempted to have sex with her.
The man then fled the house with their son. He returned the child about two hours later.
The next day, he was intercepted by police after he’d taken another child from the home.
In a police interview, he denied he’d gone to the Officer home on 11 June, claiming he’d only been at home and a temple that evening.
In sentencing on 5 September, judge Anne Hassan said it was a serious example of family violence and a “vicious” sexual assault – which was a “gross breach” of his wife’s privacy and autonomy.
She noted his “inability to reform” despite receiving multiple court orders and taking part in a men’s rehabilitation course.
“You remain a continued risk to the safety of any future intimate partner.”
Being a non-citizen, the man was at risk of deportation and being forever estranged from his children.
In mitigation, the judge noted the man’s guilty plea after a sentence indication.
He was jailed for up to three years and three months, with a two-year-and-two-month non-parole period.
The man had already served 15 months in pre-sentence detention.
