A woman who sexually abused her teenage stepson three decades ago has been jailed for the destructive impact her crimes had on him.
The woman, in her mid-20s at the time, initiated sexual activity three times over two years, before the boy's father discovered his wife and his son late one night in 1988 on the couch kissing, with their pants down and under a blanket.
What has been done cannot be undone.Credit:Cathryn Tremain
At that point, the father confronted his son. "Did you seduce my wife? Or did she seduce you?" he asked.
He then turfed his son out of the house and rang the boy's biological mother to collect him.
Over the years, the man was estranged from his son but stayed loyal to his new wife, even when she was last year found guilty at trial of two counts of incest and two of gross indecency.
The stepmother, now in her mid 50s, was jailed for six years and three months – and to serve three years and three months before she is eligible for parole – after a County Court judge found the offending was prolonged and a grave breach of trust.
"He was a child, you were the adult," the judge told the stepmother in sentencing remarks published on Wednesday.
"When you were discovered by [the boy's father] in a compromising position with the complainant, you left him to take the blame for what had happened.
"It is clear from his victim impact statement that your offending has had a significant impact on his life."
The woman cannot be named so as not to identify the stepson. At one point she threatened to tell his father of the abuse if he ever performed a certain sex act on another woman.
The victim, now a man in his 40s, has endured years of emotional pain, drug abuse and a sense of worthlessness, and last year told the court of the "huge impact" the offending had on him.
He didn't trust anyone, was always on alert for something bad, and put on an angry front so no one could go near him, which had led to social isolation.
He also recalled an inability to connect with family members and a sad existence as his family's "emotional punching bag", where he felt he wasn't treated with kindness.
His mother told the court of a strained relationship between her and her son, and that she felt he blamed her for not protecting him, having had her own trust betrayed by the stepmother.
In sentencing last month, the judge said the son wrote to his father in 2012 seeking acknowledgement of the abuse. But the father never accepted it happened, the court heard, and the stepmother still denied it. The son contacted police in 2013.
The jury acquitted the woman of seven charges.
The judge accepted the woman's recent medical problems, mental-health concerns and her deprived childhood, and acknowledged prison would be more burdensome.
"However ... the authorities establish that old age and ill health do not justify the imposition of an unacceptably inappropriate sentence," the judge said.
Defence counsel Kellie Blair had earlier called on the judge to spare the woman custody given "her ill health is exceptional", and her good rehabiltiative prospects.
But prosecutor Carolyn Burnside told the court the impact of the offending was profound and ongoing, and that the victim's life had been "tragically altered" during his teenage years.
Adam Cooper joined The Age in 2011 after a decade with AAP, the country's news service. Email or tweet Adam with your news tips.