A Waroona man who sexually abused a younger family member for up to five years walked free on a suspended prison sentence from the Perth District Court on Thursday.
Steven Ferraro, 43, pleaded guilty in Mandurah Magistrates Court on June 17, 2014 to a charge of indecent dealing.
In February this year he entered three guilty pleas in relation to further charges relating to the same victim.
The court heard Ferraro was 18 years old when he first abused his eight-year-old male cousin in 1990.
Horrific details read in court placed the offences at Ferraro’s Waroona home address.
Further sexual acts happened between August 1992 and January 1995.
Court transcripts detail an occasion when Ferraro was 21 years old and took his then 11-year-old victim to his bedroom.
The pair undressed and engaged in sexual activity, however the victim was never a willing partner in this.
Ferraro told his victim not to tell anyone about the abuse and threatened him.
The abuse stopped by the time the victim was 12, and the abuse was not brought to the attention of police until late 2011.
It was not until 2014 Ferraro was charged.
In sentencing Ferraro on Thursday, Judge Philip Eaton referred to victim impact statements provided to the court and said they made “disturbing and harrowing reading”.
“What you did has had, to say the least, a lasting impact,” he said.
Justice Eaton detailed Ferraro’s history and cited psychological reports which stated the offender’s IQ at “around 63”.
“It is the case that you have an intellectual disability,” he said.
“I infer that you had that intellectual disability, based on the material that’s been provided to me, at the time of your offending.”
Justice Eaton also referred to abuse he accepted Ferraro had been subjected to during his teenage years at the hands of a “predatory paedophile” who abused a number of boys in Waroona before committing suicide after being charged.
A psychological report ventured the opinion that Ferraro’s threat to his own victim may well have mimicked what happened to him at the hands of his own abuser.
"It must have had an impact upon you at that age."
- Justice Eaton.
“It must have had an impact upon you at that age,” Justice Eaton said.
“That impact may have served to distort your own adolescent understanding of what might be acceptable sexual behaviour as a teenager and young adult.”
The judge expressed his view that Ferraro’s mental functioning at the time of his offending behaviour impaired his ability to exercise appropriate judgement.
“I infer that when you were in your late teens or early 20s your intellectual functioning was then well below that of your age-matched peers and that at the time you were without the benefits of those adaptive skills and factors which have accrued in the intervening decades,” he said.
“… Having regard to your exemplary conduct over the past decades, I discern no need for personal deterrence.”
In suspending Ferraro’s inevitable prison term, Justice Eaton referred to the offending as “something of an aberration” in what had been “otherwise a law-abiding life”.
“I do agree that the objective seriousness of your offending warrants the imposition of a term of imprisonment,” he said.
“… I will take the unusual step of imposing sentences of imprisonment and suspending those terms.
“… It follows that the total effective term is one of four years and eight months’ imprisonment and I will suspend those terms for a period of two years with effect from today.”
Ferraro, who has no relevant criminal record, was warned he could serve time if he re-offended in the next two years.
