Taranaki man jailed for child sexual abuse

A Taranaki man has been sentenced to 12 years and four months in prison for sexually abusing nine victims over a five-year period.

Liam Murray Bridgeman appeared in the High Court in New Plymouth on Monday for sentencing. The 24-year-old pleaded guilty to 24 charges, 21 of which were sexual offences – including seven for rape and five for unlawful sexual intercourse.

The majority of the victims of his sexual crimes were under 16 years old at the time.

The remaining three charges involved violence, including an attack on the police officer who arrested him.

Five of Bridgeman's victims were present at his sentencing and several victim impact statements were read – including one from a victim's mother and one from a victim herself.

The victims, whose names cannot be disclosed for legal reasons, spoke about their anxiety, depression, trust issues and intimacy problems and how they blamed themselves for the crimes committed against them.

“I self-harm to deal with this trauma,” said one. “I also ended up in hospital more than once and tried to end my life. I struggled every day with small things like going to school, going to the supermarket or even just going for a walk alone.”

“For years I blamed myself for what happened to me and wondered what I could have changed.”

One said she was only 14 when she met Bridgeman and lost her virginity when he raped her.

“To this day, I feel disgust when I think about what I went through and I blame myself for not realizing how wrong the whole situation was.”

The young woman who read her own statement had a message for Bridgeman, who sat in the dock with his head bowed, dressed in a sweatshirt.

“The part of me that you took will slowly grow back into a stronger, more confident version of myself, and my fear will fade as I rebuild myself, and you will become a faded memory, a faded thought that I can leave in the past as I move on with my life because you no longer scare me.”

She said that if Bridgeman – who was reluctant to speak to psychologists about his crime, claiming he had little memory of it – was sincere in his guilty plea and felt actual guilt, “then I personally forgive you on this condition – that you accept responsibility for your wrongdoing and the trauma and pain you have caused me.”

Prosecutor Jo Woodcock said the dominant feature of Bridgeman's offending was “its sheer scale”.

“This offence represents repeated victimisation of young women by the accused over a period of approximately five and a half years when he was between the ages of 17 and 23. The prosecution's argument states that there was a degree of planning and premeditation… and that there were characteristics which suggested that the offender behaved in a manipulative manner and lured the victims with requests for help or assistance.”

Woodcock argued for a prison sentence of 18 to 20 years and wanted Bridgeman to serve at least 50 percent of the sentence before being eligible for parole.

Defense pleads for remorse

Defence lawyer Paul Keegan thanked the victims and their families on behalf of his client. He said Bridgeman, whose family was also in court, was facing conviction for some of the most serious offences “and the aggravating circumstances are obvious”.

Keegan argued that his client, who suffers from borderline personality disorder, should be credited with his guilty plea, which spared his victims the ordeal of a trial, as well as his relative youth and the fact that he had never been in court before.

“In addition, there are some small and early indications that Bridgeman regrets his crimes. However, he still has a very long way to go in that regard.”

He argued that his client would receive a double-digit prison sentence in any case and that setting a minimum prison sentence for such a young person with prospects of rehabilitation could have devastating effects.

When announcing the verdict, Judge Karen Grau agreed with the prosecution’s position.

“When I step back and look at the totality of the crime in this case, its magnitude, and that there appears to have been premeditation, manipulation, the age of the victims and the harm caused, then I believe the prosecution was right when they said the starting sentence should be at least 18 years.”

Judge Grau gave Bridgeman credit for his confession and his relatively young age, but she was concerned about his reluctance to talk about his crimes.

“I consider that the clinical psychologist may interpret the claims about memory problems as a mechanism of avoidance. I also consider that the psychologist has said that Bridgeman appears to have a preference for girls under the legal age of consent and that his behaviour may have compulsive elements.”

Judge Grau said that sometimes sentencing principles and purposes such as denunciation, deterrence and protection of the community take precedence over mitigating circumstances such as the mental health of the accused, particularly in cases of serious crimes.

“The pre-sentence report assessed Bridgeman's risk of re-offending and causing harm to others as high and the need to protect the public, particularly young women, from Bridgeman must, in my view, be the overriding reason for sentencing in this case.”

Judge Grau sentenced Bridgeman to 12 years and four months in prison and imposed a minimum term of six years before he could apply for parole.

Bridgeman's name would also be placed on the child sex offenders' register for life.

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