A 27-year-old has been handed numerous counts of incest and child sex-related charges. Photo: Michelle Kroll.
CONTENT WARNING: This article discusses alleged child sex offences.
A woman has been granted bail after she was handed 72 incest and child sex-related charges accusing her of sexually abusing her two younger sisters over seven years.
The court heard part of the reason why the 27-year-old was allowed to return home to Sydney was that she was born male but is transitioning to female, and if she were remanded into the Alexander Maconochie Centre (AMC) she would have likely been housed with male inmates.
The woman, who legally cannot be named, allegedly raped and assaulted her biological sisters in Canberra while they were between the ages of five and 12.
The alleged abuse was from 2006 to 2013, and the woman used both the infliction and threat of violence to maintain her two sisters’ silence, prosecutor Skye Jerome alleged in the ACT Children’s Court.
Ms Jerome alleged the violence included the woman holding her youngest sister’s head underwater in the bathtub because the girl didn’t want to comply with her order and locking her in the laundry.
The woman allegedly used pressure points to inflict pain on her sisters, choked them several times and kicked, punched and threatened them.
She also allegedly made threats about the family’s pets to coerce the sisters to participate in sexual activity.
The court heard she left her family’s home in 2013 after her sisters told their parents about the allegations and her father confronted her.
While she hasn’t spoken to her sisters or mother since then, she has had some contact with her father and is alleged to have made some admissions to him.
Ms Jerome also alleged she recently made another admission. When a police officer was reading the alleged facts of the case to her, she asked them to stop and said, “she expected this to happen some time in her life”.
The woman applied for bail on Wednesday (7 September), where her lawyer, Kat Duffy from Andrew Byrnes Law Group, said she required daily medications such as oestrogen as she was transgender. Ms Duffy did not know if the AMC could facilitate hormone treatment therapy.
Ms Jerome said if the woman was remanded into custody, then her understanding was she would be taken into protection due to the nature of her charges but would then likely be incarcerated with men as she was biologically male.
Magistrate Jane Campbell found it “astonishing” the woman would likely be housed in a male section of the AMC if taken into custody, which she said would not be in the interests of a person transitioning to a woman.
Ms Jerome opposed bail due to the alleged risk of the woman endangering the safety or welfare of anyone, as well as the risk of her intimidating her “vulnerable” sisters.
But Magistrate Campbell granted bail, noting the woman had no contact with her sisters for the last nine years even though she was aware allegations had been made against her and had no criminal history.
Her bail conditions include reporting to police in Sydney once a week, not contacting her family, surrendering her passport and not entering the ACT unless for legal appointments.
The woman was arrested at her Sydney home on Monday (5 September), extradited to the ACT and appeared in the Children’s Court on Wednesday as most offences are alleged to have been committed when she was under 18.
The counts before the Children’s Court are 14 of incest and 20 of committing an act of indecency on a child under 10, nine of incest on a child under 16, two of committing an act of indecency on a child outside Australia, four of choking, four of sexual assault, three of using the internet to deprave a young person and three of unlawful confinement.
There are also two counts in the Magistrates Court, one of committing an act of indecency and one of incest on a child under 16.
She has pleaded not guilty to all charges and her matter will be heard in court again in November.
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