Hospital sex crimes admitted
Police have dropped a charge of assault with intent to commit sexual violation because no victim could be found, but the attacker has admitted two other sex crimes.
The charge was laid while the 39-year-old man was in custody and was based upon a statement that he made to the police that he had assaulted a woman in Hagley Park near Christchurch Hospital.
The man appeared by video-link from the prison at the Christchurch District Court to plead guilty to charges of intentionally and obscenely exposing his genitals at the hospital, and assaulting a woman at the hospital with intent to commit sexual violation.
Another attack – now withdrawn – was alleged to have been committed on “an unknown person” on the same day in Hagley Park.
Police prosecutor Sergeant Mark Berryman told Judge David Saunders: “Police have been unable to identify the unknown victim and seek leave to withdrawn the charge.”
The man has had interim name suppression since his arrest and that was continued at the request of defence counsel Grant Tyrrell while psychiatric examinations continue.
The reports have shown the man does not have a defence of insanity available, but a new report has been ordered for his sentencing on June 10 to consider treatment options and how the case could be disposed of.
Judge Saunders granted the suppression order because of the psychiatric background and because the public was protected in the meantime by the man’s continued remand in custody.
Sergeant Berryman said that the man was at the hospital on the early evening of January 10. When in a lift with a woman staff member, he let his pants drop, exposing his penis. He then stepped towards the woman with his hands up as though he was going to grab her.
He suddenly stopped, dropped his hands, and said: “My grandmother has just died.”
When the lift door opened, the woman briskly left and the man pulled up his pants.
About 25min later, he followed a woman down a hall and asked her for help to find his way out of the hospital. She showed him to the closest exit but he grabbed her from behind with a hand covering her mouth. When he heard footsteps nearby, he let her go and said: “I’m sorry. I’m sexually frustrated.”
There was no physical injury to the victims, but they feared for their safety, the police said.
The man told police he was taking responsibility for his actions.
“I was drunk, mentally unwell and fearing for my life. I was sexually frustrated and wanted to have sex with those females by sexually abusing them and raping them, but I didn’t rape them because they fought me off.”
Category: News
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