Nine teenagers who pleaded guilty in the 2005 gang rape of a 10-year-old girl in Aurukun, Cape York, Australia received no jail time when sentenced yesterday. The case has sparked outrage and
demands by aboriginals that District Judge Sarah Bradley be fired.
During sentencing, Bradley told the defendants that the girl
was not forced and she probably agreed to have sex with all of you.
Six defendants, who were younger than 17 at the time the incident occurred, were given 12 months' probation and no recorded convictions. The other three defendants, ages 17 to 26, received six-month suspended prison sentences.
Queensland Attorney-General Kerry Shine is appealing the sentences, while Premier Anna Bligh said all aboriginal sexual assault cases in the remote Cape York area would be reviewed. The Director of Public Prosecutions, Leanne Clare, is reviewing approximately "75 similar cases."
Additionally, according to the
Australian Broadcasting Corp, Crown Prosecutor Steve Carter has been suspended because court transcripts reveal that he told the court that
sex was not consensual in a legal sense, but consent was given in a general sense.
Child Safety Department officers were disciplined for removing the girl, who had been previously sexually abused, from a foster home in Cairns and sending her back to Aurukun, where the gang rape then occurred. She had been returned to Aurukun to live in her native aboriginal setting; however, that policy is now being reviewed, on the basis that the ethnic or racial background of other children doesn't lead to them being placed in "like" homes when placed in foster care.
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