A Hastings teenager has been sentenced to four-and-a-half years' jail for the repeated rape of a 5-year-old girl that was revealed only when he told his church pastor who insisted he confess to police.
In Napier District Court yesterday, Judge Geoff Rea was told there had been no change in the girl's behaviour to alert others to what had happened.
Police had no knowledge of the offence until the youth went to a police station with lawyer Bill Calver and unveiled the five offences during a fortnight of school holidays.
The teen consequently pleaded guilty to one representative charge of sexual violation by rape.
The judge recognised the "unusual" nature of the confession, concession of wrongdoing and remorse. He said the youth had had a "cloistered" lifestyle backgrounded by the ties to the church, the rules of which he had offended by going on to the internet from time to time and viewing pornography in the time before the rapes occurred.
