Pedophile who broke into homes to film himself masturbating and sexually assaulting sleeping kids gets 9 years
A pedophile father, who broke into family homes and filmed himself sexually assaulting sleeping children between the age of two and 16, and masturbating, has been sentenced to nine years in prison.
The man, 31-year-old Dwayne Ferguson, pleaded guilty to charges including rape, indecent treatment of a child and making child exploitation material at Hervey Bay Magistrates Court on Wednesday, November 28.
He was earlier accused of creeping into children's bedrooms of homes north of Brisbane, between October 2015 and May 2018, according to a Daily Mail report.
"You recorded your abhorrent behavior," the judge told Ferguson as he wiped away tears from his eyes inside the court. "You inflicted lifelong injuries on many families."
Before the judge gave his verdict, the prosecutor reiterated a number of instances of his heinous crimes. In one of the instances, Ferguson filmed himself repeatedly masturbating over a teenage girl as she slept, ejaculating into her hair at one point.
In another incident, he filmed himself fingering a two-year-old girl during the middle of the night. On a third occasion, a nine-year-old girl woke up at night to find Ferguson standing over her shining his phone torch down on her.
When she tried telling her parents what had happened, they did not believe her and thought she had just experienced a nightmare. It was only when they were contacted by detectives that they believed their daughter's story.
The police recovered a number of child pornography videos from Ferguson's home. From the tattoos visible in the videos, the police confirmed that the man in the recordings was Ferguson.
Several statements from the families of the victims were read out in court. One of them called him a "vile monster" while another called his actions "sickening and gut-wrenching".
One statement shared that the experience caused a two-year-old girl so much trauma that she no longer enjoyed Christmas out of fear that Santa Claus would enter her house when she is sleeping.
"No parent should hear this about their child who should be safe and sound in their bed. It is a horror story which has become our reality," one of the statements read.