A man pleaded guilty in the Supreme Court in Launceston to a count of persistent sexual abuse of a child or a young person under the age of 17 years on Friday.
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The court heard that the man was a school teacher when he had sexual intercourse with a girl over four years before the turn of the century.
However, a factual dispute emerged during the sentencing hearing when defence counsel Evan Hughes said that his instructions were that the first act of sexual intercourse between the man and the girl occurred a year later than suggested by the Crown.
"This is a major factual dispute," Justice Stephen Estcourt said.
"The State's position is as per the complaint," Crown prosecutor John Ransom said.
"This is a problem that should have been raised far earlier,"Justice Estcourt said.
"I'll need to take further instructions," Mr Hughes said.
"You will because this is not going any further until this is resolved," Justice Estcourt said.
"I order that transcript be made available."
Justice Estcourt said that the Crown had suggested a date when the complainant was barely (age withheld by The Examiner) and now, while "Mr Hughes says it is another nine months later to the middle of the next year".
Also during the hearing, Mr Hughes applied to Justice Estcourt for a suppression order on the man's name to protect the victim.
Crown prosecutor John Ransom said during his submission that the victim was not against the publication of the man's name.
When prompted by Mr Hughes at the end of the hearing Justice Estcourt did not make a suppression order. "Section 194K [of the Evidence Act] covers the situation," he said.
"Clearly to name the complainant, the defendant, the school or the time is identification information within the meaning of the Act.
"There is no order I can make, the Section applies."
In his statement of facts, Mr Ransom said the acts occurred at a time when the girl had problems at home and she looked up to the man as a male role model.
He said she and her friends talked to the man but she wanted to talk to him without her friends.
They began to walk home and eventually he invited her inside to listen to music and gave her biscuits that he knew to be her favourite.
Mr Ransom listed four counts of unlawful sexual intercourse where a date could be identified.
The third act resulted in the girl becoming pregnant and she was prompted to leave school.
The baby was given up for adoption and the complainant is unaware of their whereabouts.
In a victim impact statement she read to the court, the woman said the circumstances had changed her life, affected her sense of identity and her capacity to have a relationship.
She said she felt that her childhood was stolen.
"My education was sabotaged by his crimes," she said.
She said child sexual abuse thrived on secrecy.
"What an easy target I was to grooming ... how innocent and naive I was," she said.
She said that the baby was the only one she had given birth to in her lifetime.
She recalled the trauma of giving birth and having the baby taken by the Department with "no counselling, no support".
"How is my [child] where is [he/she] what has [he/she] become," she said.
Mr Ransom said an aggravating factor of the crime was that the man was in a position of authority and it was an abuse of trust.
He said the court needed to take into account sentencing patterns for the crime.
In mitigation, Mr Hughes said that the man had been furnished with the VIS in recent weeks and was profoundly saddened by the consequences of the connection.
He said that the man had taught around Tasmania had shaped the lives of "countless teenage persons" without any suggestion of impropriety.
Mr Hughes said the "person who sits before you today will not fit comfortably in a prisons structure".
"He has led a blameless life apart from what he comes before you today on," he said.
Mr Hughes submitted that the man had genuine feelings of affection and love for the complainant.
He said he had continued to send letters and communications even after the birth of the child.
Mr Hughes said the Crown papers [pp144-169] contained letters he wrote after the birth which revealed genuine and real affection for the complainant.
At this stage in the hearing, the factual dispute referred to earlier in this report occurred.
The case was adjourned for a disputed facts hearing until August 9.
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Nick Clark
I am the Supreme and Magistrates Court reporter for the Examiner for the past 18 months. My journalism career has clicked over 30 years and encompasses four different spells at Tasmanian newspapers.
I am the Supreme and Magistrates Court reporter for the Examiner for the past 18 months. My journalism career has clicked over 30 years and encompasses four different spells at Tasmanian newspapers.
