A man who broke into a sleeping woman’s room and fondled her has been sentenced to five years in prison on a single count of indecent assault.
Appearing via video-link from Northward Prison on Thursday, 10 Aug., Willard Guidelitti Hurlston listened as Justice Philip St. John-Stevens handed down the sentence in Grand Court.
The incident occurred shortly after 4am on 23 Dec. 2021, when Hurlston, who had spent the night at the woman’s Bodden Town home as a guest, awoke from the living room where he was sleeping on a couch.
He then proceeded to pick the lock of the bedroom door, which had been secured by the victim before going to sleep. Hurlston, who was 48 years old at the time, was known to the then 33-year-old victim and was a frequent visitor to her home.
“She had gone to bed, feeling safe in her own home, her own bedroom and her own bed… only to be awoken to find your hands in her underwear [indecently assaulting her]” said St. John-Stevens. “You effectively broke into this woman’s room where she should have felt safe… and sexually assaulted her.”
Hurlston had denied the allegations ever since the matter first appeared before the courts.
When giving evidence in his defence, during a judge-alone trial in February, Hurlston said the victim made up the allegations because he refused to transfer a car into her name, adding that he never indecently assaulted her at any time.
However, incriminating text messages from Hurlston to the victim asking her not to tell, were eventually be used to convict him.
“Ultimately, when he realised that his protestations of innocence would be rejected, he apologised and asked the victim not to tell,” said St. John-Stevens. “He still does not accept his guilt.”
After sentencing Hurlston to five years in prison, the judge issued a provisional sexual harm prevention order against him, which prohibits him from contacting the victim, either directly or indirectly, for 12 years.
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