Three Pakistani gang rapists who are facing life in jail yesterday begged a judge to be pardoned, citing cultural differences that led to the brutal attack, immaturity on their part and hardship within their families if they were imprisoned.
| Which culture condones gang rape? Oh. I forgot... |
But Supreme Court Justice Brian Sully said "culture or no culture", a strong message needed to be sent to other young men that such horrific sex crimes against women will not be tolerated in modern society. Andrew Haesler, for one of the defendants, known as MMK, 17, said his client was immature and had lived in Australia for two years without the "restrictive boundaries" in his home country.
| That's why he went out and raped somebody? Do all immigrants do that? |
But Justice Sully said the crime could not be passed off as a "youthful indiscretion that has somehow gone wrong".
| Justice Sully sounds like he's got his head screwed on right... |
"Sixteen or not, what he did is absolutely repellent behaviour, and it's adult-type behaviour," he said. "It has to be established once and for all that culture or no culture, wherever he came from, however old you are, this cannot be tolerated in modern society." Five males, four of whom are brothers, were found guilty last year of nine counts of aggravated sexual assault in company - which carries a maximum life sentence - on two girls, aged 16 and 17, at the brothers' Ashfield family home on July 28, 2002. The girls were repeatedly raped, threatened with knives and bullets and one was told the other had been killed because she had resisted her attackers. None of the men can be named because the younger brothers, MMK and MRK, 18, were minors at the time. Another man, known as RS, is 25. Two of the men, known as MSK, 25, and MAK, 23, sobbed openly in court, maintaining their innocence and begging for "another chance".
| I'll bet the girls sobbed openly, too, during the festivities... |
The brothers are representing themselves because they believe an anti-Muslim conspiracy has prevented a fair hearing.
| "Yeah. If we wudn't Muslims, nobody woulda said nothin'!" |
Their father, a practising doctor, told the court they should be pardoned because they "did not know the culture of this country".
| ... and the culture of their own country includes casual gang rape. |
Justice Sully said the victims' impact statements had greatly affected him: "I have not heard . . . anything like it . . . something proper needs to be done to get the message out to the adolescents and teenagers." The men are the first to be convicted of the new offence of aggravated sexual assault in company, which carries a maximum life penalty. |