A dancer says she has lost her greatest joy after being raped by a Canberra labourer, who appears to be "minimising" his crimes in the eyes of a psychologist and prosecutor.
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Jake Elias Versteeg, the son of one of Australia's top burlesque performers, met his victim on a burlesque-themed cruise and developed an infatuation before raping her at his Waramanga home.
The 30-year-old has previously pleaded guilty to charges of engaging in sexual intercourse and committing an act of indecency without consent in June 2018.
He appeared in the ACT Supreme Court for a sentence hearing on Friday morning, when Crown prosecutor Rebecca Christensen read a statement from the victim.
The woman said in the statement that Versteeg's offending had left her scared of not only strangers, but her friends, and she now had no idea who to trust.
"In the last two years of my life, I have not left my house once without breaking into a cold sweat," the woman said.
Prior to the incident, she said, her greatest joy in life had been dancing and performing for others.
But because of what Versteeg did, her body no longer looked or felt like hers.
"I find it terrifying for people to watch me," she told the court in her statement.
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She described the rape as a humiliating experience and said she now had to sleep with the lights on to feel safe.
Versteeg was walking around free, she said, at a time she felt less and less free herself because of her mental trauma.
At work, she said, barely a day went by without her being overwhelmed by emotion and needing to hide in a bathroom.
"I've become a well-oiled machine, timing cry breaks so no one would notice," she said.
Ms Christensen urged Justice John Burns to sentence Versteeg to full-time imprisonment, saying nothing less would be appropriate.
While the Crown accepted that Versteeg's penetration of the victim had been brief, Ms Christensen said the victim had "repeatedly expressed her lack of consent" with a variety of words.
Versteeg did not listen and only stopped when the woman bit him on the shoulder.
The prosecutor said Versteeg did not plead guilty until "the last possible moment" and continued to demonstrate "an apparent lack of insight" into the seriousness of his actions.
She said recent expert assessments of Versteeg, including from a psychologist, had indicated that he had "problematic beliefs about consent" and that he was seeking to "minimise" his conduct.
"He did not feel it was as big a deal as what is being made out," Ms Christensen said.
But Versteeg's barrister, Margaret Jones, pointed to a number of things as proof of her client's contrition, including text messages in which he had tried to apologise to the victim shortly after the incident.
"To suggest he has no remorse for what he has done is contrary to the facts," Ms Jones told the court.
She said as far as these types of offences were concerned, Versteeg's crimes would be at "the lower end" of seriousness because of factors like the "relatively short" duration.
Ms Jones argued Versteeg's actions were impulsive and consistent with his long-standing diagnosis of "severe" ADHD, rather than being planned or premeditated.
She said Versteeg had stopped taking his medication at the relevant time, but he had since recommenced the use of Ritalin.
Ms Jones tendered seven references, which she said were proof Versteeg's offending was out of character.
She also called evidence from Versteeg's aunt, Alexandra Bagnara, who said the labourer would struggle in prison "being the sensitive young man that he is".
The court heard Versteeg had been assessed as suitable for an intensive correction order, and Ms Jones urged Justice Burns to impose this sort of sentence.
She acknowledged that a jail sentence served in the community would be "unusual", but not unprecedented in a case like this.
Justice Burns indicated he would hand down a sentence on September 25.
