Vic: Ex-Giants boss convicted of child porn

AAP General News (Australia)
04-29-2008
Vic: Ex-Giants boss convicted of child porn

MELBOURNE, April 29 AAP - The former boss of the now disbanded Victoria Giants National
Basketball club will have to register as a sex offender after being convicted of downloading
explicit images of under-age girls.

Rodney Neil Hind, 49, who is in jail for having sex with a girl under 16, was handed
a two-month suspended sentence for 12 months in the County Court after pleading guilty
to downloading child pornography.

Justice Meryl Sexton said today's sentence combined with his previous offence, meant
Hind would become a registerable sex offender and would have to report to police annually
for the rest of his life.

She said Hind, who had pleaded guilty, had shown remorse for his offence and she believed
his chances of rehabilitation were good.

Justice Sexton said he had been active in sport and had been a teacher for 20 years
with no signs of wrongdoing.

She said his second marriage had suffered because of his offences but his wife and
two young children were standing by him.

"Your fall from grace is the community's loss as well as a personal loss," Justice Sexton said.

Police seized Hind's work and home computers in August 2006 with one file holding 25
images of a girl who appeared to be under 16 years of age and two other files with images
of girls who looked to be under 18.

The judge said that without people like Hind accessing this sort of material, the unscrupulous
providers would not be able to exploit under age girls.

She said Hind had not actively sought out underage girls but had "naively" believed
that the images he downloaded were of girls older than 18.

There were no images of pre-pubescent girls but "you did have a preference for petite,
adolescent and young adult females and what were in my view a lot of underage child pornography,"

Justice Sexton said.

AAP jxt/gfr/maur/bwl

KEYWORD: HIND

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