Judge Urges Harsher Penalty For Sex Crimes

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30783, 22 June 1965, Page 8

Judge Urges Harsher Penalty For Sex Crimes

(N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright)

SYDNEY, June 20. The maximum penalties for sex offences in New South Wales were harshly criticised by a Supreme Court judge when he said women must be allowed to walk the streets without fear of being molested.

Referring to the maximum penalty of three years for indecent assault of a female, the judge, Mr Justice Isaacs said “It screams for urgent atention by the Legislature.” The penalty was “ridiculous, ludicrous and appalling,” he said. He was sentencing a 22-year-old labourer to three years’ gaol for having indecently assaulted a 19-year-old girl at Paddington, an inner Sydney suburt>. The man, Brian Johnson, had originally been charged with having raped the girl, and with having performed an act of indecency on her. Johnson pleaded not guilty to the rape charge and the Crown accepted a plea of guilty to the indecent assault charge. Mr Isaacs said women in the community “must be protected from this type of offence and be allowed to walk the streets without molestation and interference.” “The section of the Act, which deals with this offence, was placed on the statute hooks in 1910, and has not been altered since,” he said. “It is ludicrous and appalling that the penalty for as-

saults on females, which may be accompanied by the most gross and disgusting acts of indecency that may have the profoundest effect on the woman victim, is only three years. This ridiculous period of three years may usefully be compared with some other sentences: using cattle of an-

other person without permission—three years; or maliciously allowing cattle to stray on to cultivated land —four years,” Mr Isaacs said. “I trust these comparisons will show how hopelessly antiquated and thoroughly disproportionate is the maximum sentence for indecently assaulting a female.”