WELLINGTON – A New Zealand pedophile who groped a 10-year-old girl, and then groped and stuck his tongue down the throat of her 12-year-old sister, has been jailed for nearly three years.
The indecent assaults on the girls, which happened in Upper Hutt in 2013, affected them so much they have to sleep with their bedroom doors locked and one keeps a hammer under her pillow.
Wainuiomata man Phillip Antone Paul, 56, was sentenced in the High Court at Wellington yesterday.
He was earlier found guilty in the District Court of one count of indecent assault against a female under 12 and one of indecent assault against a girl under 16.
Justice Brendan Brown said Paul had kissed and rubbed the 10-year-old’s bottom on the first occasion but then the offending against the 12-year-old, six weeks later, could be considered more serious.
He had told her she was beautiful and wished he was younger so he could marry her. He put his tongue down her throat and hand down her pants but stopped before he was caught. The offending only came to light when the girl told a friend.
Paul was jailed for 10 years in 2002 for three counts of raping a girl under 12 and attempting to procure a miscarriage, among other charges.
The previous offending meant Justice Brown raised Paul’s jail term by five months to two years and nine months.