Judges support pedophile decision
16.02.2008
JUDGES around Australia yesterday closed ranks around Queensland colleague District Court judge Sarah Bradley following her decision to grant a pedophile, who admits he forced an indigenous boy to perform oral sex on him, time to prepare evidence that he was educating his 11-year-old victim about ``men's business''.
Following The Australian's revelation yesterday of Judge Bradley's latest contentious decision, Premier Anna Bligh promised that the state would mount a strong argument against the proposition that sexual abuse of children was ``men's business'' in some indigenous communities.
Judge Bradley has delayed sentencing confessed pedophile James Last to allow him to gather evidence that a four-month period of sexual abuse to which he subjected the Torres Strait boy 15 years ago was ``culturally appropriate'' and ``men's business''.
She is the same judge who The Australian revealed last year had failed to send to prison any of the nine adults and teenagers who pleaded guilty to gang-raping a 10-year old intellectually impaired girl from Aurukun on Cape York, prompting calls by indigenous leaders for her to be sacked.
Judicial Conference of Australia chairman, judge Bruce Debelle, said yesterday that Last, like any accused person, was entitled to present evidence in mitigation of his offending.
``He is entitled to an adjournment to obtain that evidence, although he might be criticised for having not obtained it earlier,'' hesaid.
Queensland District Court Chief Judge Patsy Wolfe said ``when it emerges during a sentence proceeding or hearing that there are factual issues in dispute between the Crown and the defence, the court must determine the factual dispute prior to sentencing the defendant''.
Last, a Sydney-educated teacher, last week pleaded guilty to seven counts of indecently dealing with an 11-year-old boy from Saibai Island in the Torres Strait. Evidence was given that he forced the boy to perform oral sex on him in his Cairns home over four months in 1983 when Last was aged 37, and had convinced the boy's parents to let their child come to live with him in Cairns so he could get a proper education.
Judge Bradley granted a three-month adjournment to allow Last to get a report from an anthropologist to support his claim that he had been trying to introduce the boy to ``traditional Islander sexual practices''.
When that proposition was put to Judge Bradley, prosecutor Skye Growden said she had two elders from Saibai Island who would give evidence that child abuse played no part in islander traditions. But the elders were not heard.
Ms Bligh said in Cairns that the suggestion put by Last's counsel would be vigorously challenged by the Crown at the sentence hearing.
Ms Bligh said she would wait until she had been presented with a full report into sentencing for sexual abuse cases on Cape York before she commented on Judge Bradley's future.
