Mount Isa paedophile Brendan Schulz re-sentenced for child sex abuse in Philippines

Mount Isa paedophile Brendan Schulz re-sentenced for child sex abuse in Philippines

Convicted paedophile Brendan Curt Schulz has been re-sentenced for the “appalling nature” of his sexual abuse of children in the Philippines. 

In November, 2021, Schulz was sentenced in the Queensland Supreme Court to nine years in prison after pleading guilty to 33 charges of child sexual abuse.

On Friday, Schulz was re-sentenced in the Brisbane Court of Appeal to serve 13 years in prison, with a non-parole period of seven-and-a-half years.

The re-sentencing comes after the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions appealed the original decision on the grounds it was “manifestly inadequate”.

Court of Appeal Justices John Bond and Jean Dalton supported the appeal.

‘Gross exploitation’ of children

Schulz was arrested in May, 2020, in relation to the sexual abuse of 13 children in the city of Zamboanga. A woman, who was related to the children, was also arrested.

Seven boys and six girls were rescued from a location in Zamboanga following a joint investigation between the Australian Federal Police and Philippines authorities.

Schulz was found guilty of charges relating to the persistent sexual abuse of children, procuring children for sexual abuse and transmitting sexual abuse material.

Publicly-available court documents detailing Schulz’s offending state he used Facebook Messenger to communicate with a woman in the Philippines who had an eight-year-old daughter and a niece who was three to four years old.

Schulz made arrangements to pay the woman for the provision of sexual materials involving children, court documents state.

The documents reveal that, on six separate occasions, Schulz used live stream video to direct the sexual abuse of the eight-year-old girl by several older male participants and the mother.

Justice Bond said the “appalling nature of the live streamed shows … which the respondent directed for his own disordered sexual gratification constituted grave offending.”

Justice Bond said Schulz’s abuse “involved gross exploitation of a vulnerable child in a foreign land by the corruption of the familial ties on which the child should have been able to rely for protection.”

“The fact that the respondent only solicited and directed the abuse and did not physically participate in it did not render the offending less grave,” he said.

Justice Dalton said the severity of the case warranted a re-sentence.

“In my view the sentence at first instance was very much below what was required … having regard to the fact that the offending is so serious, and the respondent is still detained, this case is one where the court ought to re-sentence,” she said.