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	Church Leader's Abuse Shame By Mike Dinsdale Northern Advocate June 16, 2010 http://www.northernadvocate.co.nz/local/news/church-leaders-abuse-shame/3914123/ A Northland religious leader who sexually abused five children over 23 years is fighting to keep his name secret. The man appeared in the High Court at Whangarei yesterday for sentencing on 15 charges of sex offences against children aged under 16 between 1967 and 1990. He had earlier pleaded guilty to one charge of doing an indecent act on a boy aged under 12. He was also found guilty by a High Court jury on two counts of doing an indecent act on a boy aged under 16; two of indecent assault on a boy aged under 16; seven of indecent assault on a boy aged under 12; one of indecently assaulting a girl aged under 12; two of inducing a boy aged under 12 to do an indecent act and a representative charge of sodomising a boy aged under 16 over a 10-year period. After sentencing the man to 7 years' jail for "gross and despicable" crimes that had caused "agony" for several families, Justice Warwick Gendall refused to grant the man name suppression. Justice Gendall said the victim who had been repeatedly sodomised by the man wanted him named to protect the public, and he agreed. However, the man's lawyer, Nick Leader, will appeal to the High Court against the decision not to grant name suppression and the man was granted interim name suppression until 5pm on Tuesday to allow it to be filed. During the sentencing Justice Gendall said the man had abused his position as a church and community leader to prey on young victims. His actions had had devastating effects on several families. "You held a position of trust in [the church] that allowed you to project an air of responsibility to cover up what you were doing," Justice Gendall said. "One of your victims said he saw you as a wolf in sheep's clothing." The judge said that in his 15 years as a High Court judge he had never read-victim impact statements as moving or as tragic as the ones from the man's victims. "They make dreadful reading," Justice Gendall said. He said relationships within some of the victims' families had been destroyed because when some of the victims spoke up about the abuse they were not believed over the word of a man "they saw as a priest". Justice Gendall said he had to sentence the man under the relevant Sentencing Act from the time of his offending. He said if he had been sentencing the man under today's Sentencing Act the starting point for his imprisonment would be 16 to 20 years, and probably towards the higher end of that because of the serious aggravating features of the offending. Justice Gendall said an appropriate starting point under the relevant act for the lead charge - the representative sodomy count - was nine years' jail, which he reduced by 18 months for mitigating factors, including the man's age, ill health and lack of previous convictions. The man was sentenced to concurrent three-year jail terms on each of the other charges, meaning the maximum time he will serve is 7 years.
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