Sexual offences against children under 10 (ss 66A and 61M(2) Crimes Act 1900) will normally attract full-time custodial sentences. Factors commonly present in intrafamilial child sexual abuse cases — including the offender's age, absence of criminal record, contrition, spontaneity of offences, low risk of re-offending, and the victim's family's wishes — are individually and collectively of little weight in supporting a non-custodial sentence. A plea of guilty entered after the offender was caught in the act carries little mitigating weight and is not evidence of contrition.
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