A WOMAN jailed for indecently assaulting her infant grandchild in the making of a pornographic video and then working with her partner to make a second vile video when the child was a toddler had committed a gross breach of trust, the sentencing judge has said.
“Her breach of trust was even greater than his as she is the victim’s biological grandmother, her own flesh and blood,” Judge Deborah Payne said in sentencing the pair in Wagga District Court on Thursday.
The man, 46, and woman, 50, were both jailed for five years, backdated to their arrests in February this year, and will be parole for one year and nine months after release.
The male accused pleaded guilty to six indictable offences while the woman admitted to four offences.
The pair, who were arrested at Young, cannot be named for legal reasons.
The man and woman made a pornographic video of a female toddler while the youngster sat in the back of a car.
The court was told the woman was instructing the child to make certain movements even though the child was crying and saying “my tummy hurts”.
“They were working as a team,” Judge Payne said.
“True it is that he was directing certain actions, but the co-accused had the connection with the child and referred to herself as ‘nanny’ to get the child to do certain things.
“He continued even after the child complained of a sore stomach, she was crying and then she hurt herself, and they still continued,” the judge said.
“They showed a callous disregard for the child.”
The woman indecently assaulted a baby, believed to be the same but younger victim, on a change table in the making of an earlier child abuse video discovered by police when they raided her home.
Judge Payne found the woman demonstrated very little contrition for her offending and that she had tried to shift responsibility away from herself.
The court heard the pair was caught with thousands of pictures and hundreds of videos of other children subjected to various degrees of sexual abuse, some involving pain and humiliation.
“The community views with abhorrence the mistreatment of children,” Judge Payne said.
“This child, aged one, was completely incapable of protecting herself.
“The courts must do what they can to protect children from predatory behaviours.”
Judge Payne said while there was no physical harm done to the grandchild she was not prepared to accept the tender age of the victim meant she would not suffer any lasting psychological impact.
