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A former Sydney police officer grossly abused his position of trust by having sex with a 15-year-old girl he met at her school while investigating whether she’d been assaulted, a judge has said.
Matthew Townsend, 29, was sentenced at Campbelltown District Court to six years in jail after pleading guilty to two counts of sexual intercourse with a child aged between 14 and 16.
Former police officer Matthew Townsend has been sentenced for having sex with a teenage girl.Credit: Facebook
Judge Julia Baly, SC, said the offences “were planned and carefully orchestrated”.
“Mr Townsend grossly and egregiously abused the trust reposed in him as a police officer.”
The court heard Townsend was working in Campbelltown with NSW Police when he was called to the girl’s school on August 3 last year after she reported being physically assaulted by another student.
Using the phone number he received while making the report, he texted the girl to say: “I’m here if you want someone random to chat to [about the incident].”
A few days later, he contacted her on Instagram to say: “You’re cute. Would you like to meet up?”
The teenager initially deleted the messages, thinking she did not know the man, but began responding once Townsend revealed himself as the police officer she met at her school. He told her to keep their chats secret or he would get into “serious trouble”.
Over the next six weeks, the pair continued to talk over social media.
Townsend said he would buy her a mango-flavoured Monster energy drink if she met up with him, before asking “what’s the limits” if they were to meet up.
Matthew Townsend bribed the girl with vapes and alcohol in return for sexual favours.Credit: Facebook
He asked if she would want to “hook up” but the girl initially refused. A persistent Townsend succeeded in an agreement of “friends with benefits” with a barrage of pleading texts.
He offered to give the girl “food, drinks alcohol and lifts”.
The first sexual encounter happened on September 19, after the victim asked Townsend if he could send her some vodka cruisers via an Uber while she was at a friend’s house, but said she had no money. He told her she could “pay another way”.
Townsend picked her from her friend’s house and drove them to a secluded car park, where they had sex several times in the back of his car, including once without protection.
He previously expressed disappointment via text that she wanted him to wear a condom so she wouldn’t get pregnant, writing: “I’m sure that won’t happen.”
A few days later, the pair had sex again in exchange for three vapes.
Less than a week later, the teen told Townsend she thought she was pregnant, so he said he would send her $800 for an abortion. He asked: “Surely you don’t want me going to jail?”
Later tests confirmed she was not pregnant.
The distraught girl confided in her mother about the abuse before reporting it to police.
NSW Police said they terminated Townsend’s employment in October 2022, about the time of his arrest. He has been in custody since.
Appearing via audiovisual link from the Silverwater Correctional Complex, Townsend sat with his head down as he learnt his fate.
The court heard Townsend initially told psychologists he felt lonely and isolated at the time of the offending, often spending 16 hours a day video-gaming. He said he only intended to form a companionship and pursue someone to talk to.
But Baly said he was “well aware” he was conditioning or grooming the girl with “increasingly sexualised language”.
“He was a police officer who was on duty, investigating a potential offence involving this victim, where he commenced his course of priming her for his sexual gratification,” she said.
Baly said he had since shown some degree of remorse, had good prospects of rehabilitation and was unlikely to reoffend.
She found special circumstances due to Townsend needing rehabilitation programs and specialised mental health support that could not be provided in prison, as well serving his first custodial sentence, which he’d done in “harsh conditions”.
Receiving a 25 per cent discount for an early guilty plea, Townsend was sentenced to six years in jail with a three-year non-parole period that will make him eligible for release on September 30, 2025. The sentence was backdated to October 1, 2022 and will expire on September 30, 2028.
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