Headlines have echoed throughout Australia in relation to the suspended sentence granted to a foreigner, then aged 16, who orally raped an 18 year old girl after they had consensually engaged in kissing in a public park after a house party in Canberra.
As noted in the sentencing decision (DPP v Hancock[2026] ACTSC 389) handed down by Muller J; the victim, describes the shame she felt from allowing herself to be trapped in this situation. She asked Mr Hancock (a pseudonym) to stop. His statement that he was not finished echoes in her mind. The only course of action she felt she could take was to wait out the assault.
DS was excited for adventures and opportunities having just turned 18 years of age, and instead she met with a boy who raped her at a house party which was “filled with people [she] knew and went to school with”.
She details her loss of dignity, confidence and sense of self because of the assault. She “can no longer call [her] body [her] own.” DS says that night her life was stolen and will forever be changed; she will always be a victim in some light. For six months after the offending, she struggled with basic tasks like brushing her teeth, bathing and general personal care because of the impact of the assault.
DS described perceiving herself more as an object than a person, and developing a warped sense of sex and intimacy. She still gets flashbacks of the assault and her feelings of helplessness.
In the decision, there was competing argument about the penalty that should be imposed, given the guilty plea and the young age and foreign upbringing of the offender. Ultimately, Muller J in few words identifies that his hands are substantially tied by the operation of s 7 and s 133C of the Sentencing Act which has the effect of pushing towards penalties not focused on punishment for criminal guilt but for rehabilitation.
Muller J also notes that section 10 of the sentencing act requires that “imprisonment for all or part of the term of the sentence is to be imposed only where the court is satisfied, after considering possible alternatives, that no other penalty is appropriate. Where that level of satisfaction has been reached in the case of a young offender s 133G mandates the sentence must be a last resort and for the shortest appropriate term.”
The decision, turns in your stomach. But ultimately, Legal Aid ACT was well armed with the requirements set out by parliament which have the net effect of making it extremely difficult to actually punish criminals, particularly younger ones, of a foreign background.
The judgement does not show a bleeding heart liberal trying to find a work-around to backstop a foreign criminal’s position and let him off. It shows the naked insanity of the ACT’s sentencing act which the judge is bound by law to obey. Many tears are wasted, or perhaps even wrongfully directed by throwing Justice Muller’s name and character in the gutter.
This awakening should be directed to law reform, to strip out the liberal madness in the sentencing legislation that varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Residents of all states and territories must be lobbying their members of parliament to improve sentencing legislation to focus on punishment and deterrence for violent and sexual crimes (up to and including capital punishment – televised, ideally). The next crook who thinks he can rape a girl should have a very plain terror in his mind for the fear of the swift and hard punishment of the law; hopefully to deter him.
The old tradition is this country is to hang rapists to death. As noted in the high court in Griffith v King [1937]HCA 25 where a man was sentenced to death for luring women to lonely places, the means adopted being the insertion of bogus advertisements in the press offering domestic employment or sending bogus answers to bona fide advertisements of that type.
Capital punishment is not only a fair penalty for the moral wrongdoing of rape and murder but it also serves the purpose of deterrence. In situations of vulnerability, particularly for young ladies and girls – the maximum penalty of the law must permeate the minds of would-be offenders. It is the fear of death that is often necessary and appropriate to stay the hand of a predator.
M. K. Grant
National Governor
October 2026