On 16 April 2013, KAK pleaded guilty to one count of trafficking in children contrary to subsection 271.4(1) of the Criminal Code, as well as 19 other charges under the Criminal Code Act 1899 (QLD), including maintaining a sexual relationship with a child.
The charges related to conduct by KAK that began in 2004, when KAK arranged for her nine year old daughter, who was living in Thailand at the time, to join her in Australia for a holiday. During this visit, the offender provided sexual services to customers in her daughter’s presence, and encouraged her daughter to massage and provide sexual services to customers of the massage parlour. In 2006, the offender made arrangements for her daughter to move to Australia permanently. Over the following years, the child was required to provide sexual services to various customers, with evidence revealing that in 2010, the child was made to provide these services on at least 45 occasions to seven different clients. Evidence also indicated that the child was required to provide sexual services to clients both before and after school.
Following her guilty plea, KAK was sentenced to nine years imprisonment, with a non-parole period of four years. KAK appealed against her sentence, and on 18 October 2013 it was reduced to seven years imprisonment, with a non-parole period of three years and six months.
At sentencing on appeal, the court noted that the offending by KAK with respect to child trafficking was preparatory and incidental to the other offences with respect to which she was convicted (including under s 229G(1)(a) of the Criminal Code (QLD) for procuring a child to engage in prostitution). The court noted that while it was logical to impose a head sentence with respect to the procurement of child prostitution offending, it would not be an error of law to impose the head sentence in respect of the child trafficking offence rather, such a course would need to be taken if the sentence imposed for the child prostitution offending was inadequate to reflect the child trafficking offending. This was not however, the case in this matter.