Ice addict jailed for backpacker torture
ABC
A 47-year-old ice addict who falsely imprisoned and bashed a 21-year-old Dutch backpacker has been sentenced to 17 years in jail.
Alfio Granata pleaded guilty to 14 charges, including multiple rapes, threats to kill, and intentionally causing serious injury over a six-week period in 2012.
The victim was left with 54 separate injuries after she was repeatedly beaten unconscious, violently raped and had a cross scratched into her forehead with a knife.
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The court was told Granata said the victim belonged to him and was “marked for death” for betraying him.
Judge Frank Gucciardo sentenced Granata, an ice addict since 2008, as a serious sexual offender and he will serve a minimum prison term of 13 years.
Granata was sentenced to 17 years in prison with a minimum term of 13 years.
He said Granata’s “brutality transcended all community standards” and that the crimes had caused a “significant traumatic effect” on the victim.
“This is vile and repulsive behaviour which dehumanised your victim, rendered her little more than an object to serve your depravity and sexual gratification, an object to use and abuse at your will with complete disregard for her rights, her physical integrity and her humanity,” Judge Gucciardo said.
Granata had filmed many of his crimes and the videos were tendered to the court.
The court heard that at least seven cameras had been installed inside the hotel room, including the bathroom.
“It is harrowing evidence of your inhumane behaviour,” Judge Gucciardo said.
Scars a ‘sad reminder’ of criminal conduct: judge
“The victim was in constant pain, lost consciousness, was often already injured when further violence was inflicted on her. She was degraded and humiliated as is made clear by the footage.
“The many scars she has are a sad reminder of your abhorrent criminal conduct.”
The court was told the woman only managed to escape from Granata after attempting suicide and being asked to be left to die.
When paramedics put her into an ambulance she thanked them for making her safe.
He said Granata’s victim can no longer work in the hospitality industry and has had her educational prospects dashed.
“She does not go out at night and is fearful of being alone,” he said.
“She has had to leave the small town she came from and leave her family and friends.”
In an earlier recorded victim impact statement, the woman said she could not believe she survived and could not grasp the injustice carried out against her.
She told Granata her scars remind her everyday of what a sick person he is.
Earlier this year Granata’s accomplice, 34-year-old Jennifer Mary Peaston, pleaded guilty to two counts of intentionally causing injury for her involvement in the ordeal.
But she avoided jail after the judge ruled that she had also been the victim of sustained abuse from Granata.
Granata ‘claimed to be possessed by the devil’
In an earlier hearing, the court was told when the couple first met the tourist they smoked the drug ice and had consensual sex at Rydges Bell City hotel, where Peaston and Granata were living at the time.
Days later Granata became obsessed that the two women were having a secret liaison and started to beat and threaten them.
The victim said she thought she would be killed if she tried to leave the hotel and that Granata had also made threats against her family.
Police said the pair assaulted the woman with a range of items including a meat tenderiser, a rolling pin, a vacuum cleaner and a jet lighter.
Prosecutor Nanette Rogers said Granata claimed he was possessed by the devil and the spirit of his dead grandfather.
Dr Rogers told the court on one occasion Granata put the victim’s nail cuttings, hair and blood in an envelope as part of a supposed ritual to destroy her soul.