Canberra man Antonius van de Zandt jailed for sexually assaulting his niece 37 years ago
A Canberra man who sexually assaulted his niece after a party in the 1980's has been sentenced to three years in jail, but he'll be return to the community in just six-months. Abuse survivor Queenie Van De Zandt has chosen to push aside laws designed to protect her identity speaking out about the ordeal to change attitudes about abuse.
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00:00 An uncle who abused his position of trust. Antonius Van Der Zandt was today sentenced
00:07 to three years in jail, nearly four decades after abusing his teenage niece. Queenie Van
00:13 Der Zandt was just 15 when he assaulted her while she slept in his bed after a party in
00:18 1986.
00:20 It's appropriate that my uncle goes to jail for what he did.
00:23 She's waived her right to remain anonymous to speak out against the crime.
00:27 The worst thing we can do is silence a victim because sexual violence thrives in silence.
00:34 The ACT Supreme Court heard Van Der Zandt, now 72, had admitted to the offending in the
00:39 years since it happened, but denied the charges during a trial, telling the court in a letter
00:45 that he still maintains he was asleep at the time of the incident.
00:49 Chief Justice Lucy McCallum said any apology by Van Der Zandt was undermined by his refusal
00:54 to take responsibility for the offending. His letter was a cynical exercise in self-ingratiation,
01:00 she said, and he should not be given the benefit of his self-professed remorse.
01:05 Because of Van Der Zandt's age and physical and mental health issues, he'll only need
01:09 to spend six months in prison with the rest of his sentence to be served as a good behaviour
01:14 bond. It's a case that's left the family torn, with relatives of both the survivor and the
01:20 offender sitting on opposite ends of the courtroom gallery today, but both sides were in tears.
01:27 There's no winners, you know, in a situation like that.
01:30 For now, Queenie wants to change community attitudes about sexual assault.
01:35 I encourage all victims to speak up and redirect the shame to where it belongs, with the perpetrator.
01:42 A survivor's hope that going public will make a difference for generations to come.
01:46 [BLANK_AUDIO]