Sex attack: Woman assumed bedroom intruder was one of her kids

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A woman thought one of her children was getting into bed with her when she was roused from her sleep early one morning by a dip in the mattress behind her. She went back to sleep but sat up screaming when she realised a stranger was sexually assaulting her. 

Boston Henry Peke, 43, apologised as he fled the room via an open window through which he had entered. The woman’s mother — who was also in the house — tried to chase Peke down the street but couldn't keep up.

Arrested later, he subsequently pleaded guilty to Crown-scheduled charges of burglary, indecent assault, and attempted sexual violation.

He was sentenced last Thursday in Gisborne District Court by Judge Warren Cathcart to two years and two months in jail.

The sentence also covered separate and unrelated police charges of failing to comply with the requirements of the child sex offender register, breaching police bail, and twice breaching court bail.

About 5.30am on December 10 last year, Peke climbed into bed with the woman at her home in Elgin. She was still half-asleep when he hugged her from behind, kissed her neck, moved his hand inside her pyjama pants and tried to push his fingers inside her.

She pushed him away, rolled over, then opened her eyes to see him kneeling above her.

Peke was registered as a child sex offender last January, and he was made aware of various reporting obligations, including a requirement to report to the probation service 48 hours ahead of moving house. However, on December 28 last year, the service discovered he was no longer living at his Ida Road addresss and had failed to inform anyone. When asked to explain, Peke said police should already have known.

Judge Cathcart said that excuse showed Peke either didn’t understand his obligations or simply refused to comply. However, the judge also accepted counsel Michael Lynch’s submission that it could also have been due to Peke’s itinerant lifestyle.

The judge said the Crown offences were aggravated by the obvious premeditation involved, the aspect of home invasion, and the inherent vulnerability of the sleeping woman.

He set a sentence starting point of three years, four months imprisonment, with an uplift for the police charges — adjusted for totality — of two months imprisonment.

There was no dispute from Peke’s counsel that there should be an uplift for previous relevant convictions, including an indecent assault of a child — the offence for which Peke was registered. For it, the judge added two months.

He gave Peke a full 25 percent discount (10.5 months) for his early guilty pleas and seven-and-a-half months discount for his personal circumstances — mainly for his addiction to methamphetamine — and remorse, albeit that was belatedly expressed.

Even if the end sentence had been within the threshold for conversion to home detention, he would not have granted it, the judge said. The offending was too serious and Peke had no address for the electronically-monitored alternative.  The court heard Peke, who had been in custody since March this year, would be eligible for release in a few months time.