Second-strike warning given to sex offender

By David Clarkson

A 22-year-old has been given a rare second-strike warning and is now serving a total sentence of three years nine months for his sex offending.

Tony Jessie Nesbitt is already part way through the sentence – a section of it was imposed on an earlier offence last year – but he will serve another 15 months before he can be considered for parole.

It is hoped he can carry out the Kia Marama course for child sex offenders before his release.

Christchurch District Court Judge Raoul Neave imposed the additional sentence yesterday after Nesbitt had admitted indecently assaulting a 12-year-old girl.

He read Nesbitt the second-strike warning under the Government’s regime of heavier sentences for repeat violent and sexual offenders. It means that if Nesbitt offends a third time he will serve the maximum sentence for his offence without parole. For a further indecent assault, that would be seven years.

Nesbitt was read a first-strike warning by Judge David Saunders in Christchurch District Court in January 2011, on charges of meeting a young person after sexual grooming and having under-age sex.

While he was on bail on that charge, and after his first warning, Nesbitt was at a gathering where girls aged 12 and 14 had become ill after eating food and drinking alcohol.

“People were consuming alcohol who should not have been,” said the judge.

One of the girls woke to find Nesbitt in bed with her, with his jeans pulled down and hers undone while he touched her. Nesbitt later said he was “very drunk and could not remember what, if anything, had happened”.

Nesbitt has undergone some counselling while he has been in custody since July 2011.

The judge described it as opportunistic offending.

“Provided you receive treatment, I have no reason to believe you will pose a risk,” said the judge. “If you don’t receive treatment, you certainly will.”

He discussed the complicated sentencing arrangements with the Crown prosecutor and defence counsel Andrew McKenzie before imposing a 15-month jail term that was added to the existing sentence to make a single term totalling three years nine months.