The disgraced former chief executive of Australian dairy giant Bega Cheese, Maurice Van Ryn, has been exposed for exploiting a sickening legal technicality to evade justice for his depraved crimes against a child.
Van Ryn, 62, is already serving a lengthy prison sentence for a string of child sex offences. However, a reprehensible loophole in the law allowed him to avoid a separate conviction for the horrific abuse of a young boy, simply because the acts were committed before specific legal amendments came into force.
A History of Heinous Crimes
The former multi-millionaire businessman was initially sentenced in 2015 to four years in prison for sexually assaulting a young girl. His notoriety grew when he was later convicted on further charges, including the abuse of a young boy, bringing his total sentence to 13 years behind bars.
Despite this, the court was forced to take a previously unreported act of abuse against a little boy into account as an 'aggravating factor' during sentencing, rather than as a separate charge. This was due to a legal technicality concerning the dates the offences were committed.
The Loophole That Shielded a Predator
The court heard that Van Ryn had performed a vile act on the young boy before a key change in the NSW Crimes Act. Because the law was not amended to specifically criminalise that act until after it occurred, prosecutors could not lay a separate charge for it.
This meant that while the judge acknowledged the act as a serious aggravating feature of Van Ryn's offending, he could not be formally convicted or punished separately for that specific abuse, leaving the victim without full legal recognition of the crime committed against him.
Outrage and Calls for Reform
The case has ignited fury among legal experts and child protection advocates, who condemn the loophole as a gross failure of the justice system that prioritises technicalities over victim justice.
This shocking revelation highlights a critical flaw in legislation that allows predators to evade full accountability for their actions. It has prompted urgent calls for a review and reform of historical child sex offence laws to ensure no victim is ever denied justice again due to a calendar date.
