The Goulburn Valley man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, pleaded not guilty in a committal hearing in Shepparton Magistrates’ Court online to eight charges of sexual penetration of a child.
In a committal hearing on Wednesday and Thursday, the court heard evidence from the stepdaughter who is now an adult, her sister, her brother, her mother and a police officer.
The victim told the court how, when she was 13, her stepfather told her they could “start an affair” and tried to kiss her.
A few days after this incident in 2004, the victim alleged her stepfather had sex with her for the first time in a bungalow on their property in the rural area surrounding Shepparton.
She told the court her stepfather told her not to say anything as she wouldn’t be believed.
The victim said her stepfather would come into her bedroom “on a nightly basis” to have sex.
She shared this bedroom with her younger sister, who was 11.
She also told the court her stepfather had sex with her twice on New Year’s Eve 2004, while her mother was in hospital after giving birth.
The victim also spoke about another incident on the property when she was also 13 where her mother drove up and “witnessed the end” of a sexual encounter between her and her stepfather in a car in the orchard.
Under questions from the man's barrister Glenn Casement, the victim told how she had been to the man’s house “about 10 times” since leaving home, mainly for family events, and one time to borrow a trailer and another to drop off a sheep.
The victim’s younger brother gave evidence of a memory he had at age five where he saw his stepfather on top of his sister, the victim, in the garage. Both were clothed.
He said his stepfather told him he had put a present for his mum in there and had fallen and landed on the victim while trying to reach it.
The boy told an older brother about the incident in 2018 when he was aged 18.
He said he believed his stepfather at the time because he was young. However years later he spoke up because “as I got older I knew it wasn’t right”.
The victim’s sister — who she had shared a bedroom with — told the court about how when she was 12 her stepfather had "told me he was going to come into my room after Mum had gone to sleep,” she said.
She also spoke of how her mother had quizzed her stepfather about his relationship with the victim “on more than one occasion”.
The victim’s mother, who broke up with the accused in about 2015, gave evidence that she asked her daughter about whether her stepfather was having sex with her, after she saw an incident where they were in a car together in a paddock.
The mother also spoke of another time she “pushed him off his chair” after she heard her husband “talking dirty” to her daughter while the mother was in bed.
She also told of another occasion when the man’s brother confronted him, asking if he was having sex with his stepdaughter and there was a fight about it.
Magistrate Justin Foster committed the man to stand trial in the Shepparton County Court.
The man was given bail and will face the County Court on December 10 in a directions hearing.
