But he still won't take his medicine; Stuff reports:
An Auckland comedian is appealing an eight-month home detention sentence for indecently assaulting his four-year-old daughter.
The man, who has name suppression, pleaded guilty in March to indecently asasulting the child.
At his first sentencing, Judge Philippa Cunningham discharged him without conivction saying he was a talented New Zealander and the consequences outweighed his offending.
However, The Crown then won a High Court judicial review over the discharge and ordered the District Court to resentence the man.
He was sentenced by Judge Mark Perkins in July and Fairfax Media understands the man lodged his appeal the same month he was sentenced.
A hearing was held yesterday where a judge reserved their decision.
The offending occurred on December 9, 2009, after the man returned from a Christmas party in an intoxicated state.
He tried to have sex with his then wife but she rejected him and they went to sleep. Later in the evening the child came into the bed and slept between the couple.
The man woke up and proceeded to sexually assault the child.
He claimed to have no memory of the event.
The Comedian still got off pretty lightly for what was a serious sexual assault on his four-year-old daughter. But he obviously still believes that he is the victim of this offending.
He couldn't be more wrong. The only victims of The Comedian's offending are his daughter, and his former wife. They are the ones who were traumatised by his drunken offending.
In a past life, The Comedian may have been able to "make people laugh". But there is nothing funny at all about committing sex acts on children, even if unintentional, and there is nothing funny about getting so drunk that you are unable to distinguish the private parts of a four-year-old girl from those of an adult woman.
If there is to be any chance of The Comedian making a useful contribution to the community in the future, he first needs to 'fess up and accept the consequences of his dreadful offending. In the meantime, we just wish we'd heard the last of The Comedian.
4 comments:
This would be a great case for naming and shaming. I wager that had he had his name disclosed he'd still be hiding from the sunlight.
Cadwallader
I heard he was a fan of mcgyver
KS I agree that he seems to have gotten off very lightly on this, and still doesn't seem to accept any form of responsibility.
I think also, this case highlights a further problem with NZ law, in that details of a victim and their association with the offender is able to be published, which leads to the offender having their name supppressed.
I believe that in the UK victims of sexual assault have all details about them suppressed (name, age, occupation etc), and my understanding is that it includes their relationship to the offender, in this situation it seems the offender is the one that is invariably named. It is time NZ looked at a similar law here, so the victim can be better protected. I also think that once someone has been convicted of a sexual assault they should automatically forfeit any right to name suppression.
Well said Missy. In the case of The Comedian, I think that most people have a pretty good idea of his identity. He is unlikely to work again, although I've never seen anything that he has done without his sidekick, so whether or not he can "make people laugh" on his own account is open to debate.
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