A former house mistress who unlawfully had sex with five male students at an elite NSW school has been spared further jail time after receiving an “extraordinarily lenient” suspended sentence.
“I am sure that at least the complainants’ parents will think my sentence is manifestly inadequate,” said Acting Judge Christopher Armitage yesterday in the District Court in Sydney.
But he noted the “extremely unusual circumstances” of the case, the small age difference between the woman and the students and the fact she spent 14 months in protection in jail before being granted bail.
The 25-year-old woman, who cannot be named, pleaded guilty in April to six counts of sexual intercourse with a person under her care and three of aggravated sexual intercourse during 2014 and 2015 with boys aged between 15 and 17 at The Armidale School.
Her guilty pleas were entered half-way through her second trial which followed the discharge of another jury after it could not reach verdicts.
The “extremely psychologically vulnerable” woman was 20 when she began inviting individual students into her room where they had sex and, in some cases, this occurred regularly.