A 16-year-old boy from Bhutan who sexually assaulted a girl he met at a party has avoided serving time in prison after an ACT Supreme Court judge accepted his limited insight into Australian societal norms as a mitigating factor.
As per News24, the teenager, who cannot be named because of his age, was sentenced to 18 months’ imprisonment on Tuesday. The sentence was immediately suspended, allowing him to remain in the community under a good behaviour order.
The boy had arrived in Australia from Bhutan about six months before the offending. He pleaded guilty to one count of sexual intercourse without consent.
It is reported that the court heard the teenager met the victim at a house party in 2025, when both were aged 16. He approached her while she was speaking with another young man and later asked her to go for a walk.
The pair began kissing away from the party before moving to a greenbelt after the teenager suggested they go somewhere more private.
The victim told the court she “just froze” and felt “trapped under him”. She said the sexual acts were “rough and really unpleasant” and that she wanted to leave but was frightened he would hurt her.
The court heard the teenager forced her to perform oral sex while she was crying and continued despite her pleading with him to “stop, I don’t want this”.
It is reported that Justice Andrew Muller said the teenager had deliberately moved the victim away from her friends and the “relative safety” of the party before using “considerable force in pursuit of his own sexual gratification”.
The judge said the victim had “little capacity to defend herself”.
In her victim impact statement, the girl described the impact of the assault, including feeling that she could no longer call her body her own.
The teenager said it had been his first sexual experience and wrote that he was “sickened with [him]self” over what he had done. However, he also claimed the victim was “exaggerating stuff”.
It is further reported that Justice Muller said he accepted the teenager’s prior lack of sexual experience and his short time in Australia before the offending.
“What is clear is he now realises the giving of consent to sexual interaction necessarily involves clear and active communications to that effect, not just an absence of express refusal,” Justice Muller said.
The judge said the teenager’s “inevitably limited insight into societal norms in Australia given his very short time in the country prior to the offending” was a factor mitigating his moral culpability.
The teenager will remain in the community under the good behaviour order rather than serving the 18-month sentence in custody.
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