Rapist jailed 7 years after committing crime

Press, 15 July 1987, Page 4

Rapist jailed 7 years after committing crime

PA Auckland A man aged 33 has been jailed for four years on charges of kidnap and rape, more than seven years after the crimes. Roger John Brazendale, of Mangere, found guilty by a jury of abducting and raping a woman on September 23, 1979, appeared for sentence before Mr Justice Hillyer in the High Court at Auckland. The Court had heard that the woman and some friends met Brazendale and some of his associates in a pub. She invited them to a Mt Albert party from

where she was later taken to a Mangere farmhouse. In sentencing Brazendale, his Honour said that when the prisoner learned a complaint of rape had been made and two of his friends were arrested he chose to depart immediately for Australia.

Brazendale had since rehabilitated himself and was working well, said his Honour.

Mr Justice Hillyer said he would not rid his mind, however, of the picture of the woman Brazendale battered and treated brutally in the back of the

car when he abducted her from the party. At the farmhouse, he said, she was raped not only by Brazendale but by one of the other men with him)

His Honour said he could not even give Brazendale credit for pleading guilty. Brazendale had denied the charges in his attempt to avoid responsibility for the offences.

It was obvious the matter was still real and live in the woman’s mind, and she was put through the ordeal of a trial, his Honour said.