A Dunedin paedophile has been jailed for more than four years for molesting a 7-year-old boy and trading child pornography online.
Sean Paul Clemenger (34) appeared before Judge Michael Turner in the Dunedin District Court for sentence yesterday after pleading guilty to three charges of doing an indecent act on a 7-year-old, two representative charges of distributing objectionable publications and one representative count of possessing objectionable publications.
Clemenger was also listed on the Child Sex Offender Register, which came into effect yesterday.
The indecency charges relate to molesting the 7-year-old son of friends of Clemenger's parents in 2006 and 2007.
The charges under the Film, Videos and Publications Classification Act came after a police operation earlier this year targeting those trading child porn online.
Police monitored Clemenger's online behaviour for five days in January and one day in April, during which he shared 37 movies, four photos and three slide shows depicting boys and girls aged between 5 and 14 being sexually violated, engaging in sex acts with each other or posing in a sexually explicit manner.
When police raided his house in June, they located 146 videos and 20 images of child pornography on his computer. Some of the victims were as young as 4.
Judge Turner described Clemenger's offending as deviant and a ``significant breach of trust''.
The court heard Clemenger first molested the boy on his 7th birthday in July 2006 at the boy's family home.
The second occasion occurred at Clemenger's home some time between September 2006 and April 2007.
The third occasion occurred as the defendant's and the victim's families socialised together at a pub in South Dunedin in April 2007.
``During this time the defendant accompanied the victim to a nearby church playground,'' the summary of facts said.
``The offending came as a result of you grooming the victim,'' Judge Turner said.
``The offending occurred at least once in the victim's home, a place he was entitled to feel safe.
``Your actions robbed him of his childhood.''
The victim's mother read a victim impact statement to the court detailing the substantial and long-lasting damage the offending had caused the boy.
The family had discussed the changes in the boy's behaviour, following the offending, in front of Clemenger - changes the family were at a loss to explain at the time, the victim's mother said.
``It makes us angry that during those conversations that Sean knew exactly what he had done and knowing that his molesting of [the victim] was a huge part of how he had changed,'' she said.
Judge Turner said the victim blamed himself for what happened and his family for not protecting him.
``Your behaviour has destroyed longstanding family relationships,'' he said.
The summary of facts highlighted how the material on Clemenger's computer depicted children being ``sexually abused, degraded and exploited''.
``This abuse is likely to cause serious emotional and physical harm to the child.''
``The United Nations has estimated that between 10,000 and 100,000 children are part of the child exploitation network that you are part of,'' Judge Turner said.
Clemenger's risk of reoffending was moderate to high and the court heard how he had been granted diversion by the Department of Internal Affairs in 2009 for downloading and using objectionable material.
``You reported experiencing ongoing sexual thoughts about young boys about twice a day,'' Judge Turner said. ``Those thoughts often triggered by images of young boys appearing on television.''
Defence counsel Andrew Dawson said Clemenger admitted the facts when spoken to by police. He used child pornography as a crutch to cope with stress, he said.
The summary of facts showed he admitted downloading and sharing child porn since the beginning of 2015.
He contacted police and made a full confession in relation to the molestation of the child when he realised the matter had been reported to police.
``He explained he hated himself for what he had done,'' the summary said. ``He recognises the harm he has caused and was deeply regretful of his actions.''
Judge Turner sentenced Clemenger to four years and three months' jail for the two counts of distributing child pornography, three years' jail for each count of sexual indecency and two and a-half years for possessing child pornography. He also sentenced him to two months' jail for about $4500 in outstanding fines owing to the court.
Each sentence would be served concurrently and Judge Turner imposed a minimum non-parole period of 50% of his sentence, meaning Clemenger would not be eligible for parole until mid-2018.
Clemenger sat silently and with his head bowed for the majority of the hearing, only briefly looking up to glance at his lawyer or Judge Turner.
