Police officer is found guilty of sexually abusing his teenage stepdaughter – after threatening to throw himself off a cliff when she revealed what he had done
A former South Australian police officer has been found guilty of sexually abusing his teenage stepdaughter.
He was convicted despite the man, who cannot be named to protect the identity of his victim, claiming the 15-year-old girl made up the allegations because she fantasised about having sex with him.
The former police officer had pleaded not guilty to two counts of unlawful sexual intercourse and one count of sexual assault, Advertiser reported.
The girl had told her boyfriend and a school counselor that she had been sexually abused by an older man in September or October 2021.
The court heard during the trial earlier this month that the abuse occurred after the officer had been drinking with the child in their family home.
The officer gave the victim a foot massage, prosecutor Ben Sturm told the jury. “He then put his hands on her leg and started moving slowly upward,” he said.
According to Mr. Sturm, the officer pulled the teenager onto his lap and kissed her.
He then ‘climbed on top of her and kissed her neck, then began groping her all over her body and then put his hands down her pants’, the court was told.
A former South Australian police officer who threatened to jump from a cliff has been found guilty of sexually abusing his teenage stepdaughter.
The court heard that the girl had a bite wound to her neck the next morning and that her stepfather had told her to ‘pretend it was a nuisance’.
After discovering the girl had told her supervisor about his abuse, the police officer called his partner, told her what he had done to her daughter and said he was going to kill himself, the jury heard.
Police found the man on the edge of a cliff shortly afterwards.
He admitted that he had had sexual contact with the victim, Mr Sturm said.
The officer admitted over the phone to the victim’s mother that he had made the “mistake,” that he had kissed the teen and done “other things,” but would not say what those other things were, the jury was told.
He admitted to the officer who found him on the clifftop that “it was about my stepdaughter, I made a mistake,” the court heard.
According to Mr Sturm, these confessions were ‘very convincing … they are really decisive for his guilt of those acts’.
The prosecutor said the police officer told the victim he “thought I had a dream, like I didn’t believe it actually happened” and that he had ruined her childhood.
The police officer also told the girl that if she told anyone he would commit suicide, the court heard.
But his lawyer, Paul Rice KC, told the jury the victim could have had a motive to lie about the allegations.
“She hated him and/or fantasized about having a sexual relationship with him, but he did not respond to her feelings and she decided it was time for him to leave,” Rice said, adding that it was “a false accusation.”
The police officer told the girl that if she told anyone about the abuse he would kill himself. The police station on Angas Street in Adelaide is pictured
He said the officer’s “suicide attempt … was not an admission of guilt, but of defeat and despair.
“We propose that you have reasonable doubts about the guilt of the accused and acquit him on all counts.”
The jury found the police officer guilty of two counts of unlawful sexual intercourse, and not guilty of the charge of sexual assault.
The man will appear in court again in November and will be sentenced later this year.
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