A 23-year-old man has been jailed for 12 years for raping his 32-year-old first cousin.

The Labasa High Court stated that a serious breach of family trust aggravated the offence.

He was convicted after trial.

The court heard that the victim was asleep in her bedroom when he called out to her through a window.

She invited him inside to eat.

He later went to her bedroom and suggested that she and her children move in with him. When he asked to have sex and she refused, the man admitted to forcing himself on her.

The prosecution argued that the breach of trust aggravated the offending, the fact that it happened in the victim’s own home, and that he had strangled her before raping her.

The court also considered a victim impact statement prepared by the complainant’s counsellor, which detailed the serious and lasting effects of the assault.

In sentencing, High court judge Justice Lee Burney said the offence was made more serious by the close family relationship between the two.

The judge said the court’s main concern was to show that sexual offending within families would not be tolerated, describing it as an offence that was all too prevalent in society.

The man’s lawyer told the court that he was remorseful. His defence also highlighted his age, lack of previous convictions and employment as a farmer.

However, the judge said the rapist acceptance of responsibility came too late, noting that an earlier guilty plea could have spared the victim the ordeal of testifying at trial and earned him a
significant sentence reduction.

The judge described the harm caused to the victim as profound and enduring.

The court set seven years as the starting point, adding another five years because the aggravating factors substantially outweighed the mitigating circumstances.

The man will serve eight years before becoming eligible for parole, subject to the final calculation of time already spent in custody.

He was credited with about nine months on remand, and the court set his final non-parole period at seven years and three months from the date of sentencing.

He has 30 days to appeal the sentence.