A New South Wales man who violently bashed his former girlfriend to death and left her body in a bathtub has been jailed for almost 20 years.
On June 24, 2024, Rodney Dempsey attacked Jenoa Sutton, 27, using a piece of wood and an instrument that resembled a hammer before abandoning her body in the bathtub of her Lithgow home.
When Ms Sutton failed to pick up her two children from school, Erica Ellery, her sister, went to check on her and discovered the body.
Judge Peter Hamill declared Dempsey’s crime to be “criminality of an extremely high order” and sentenced him to 19 years and nine months in jail with a 14-and-a-half year non-parole period.
According to him, Dempsey, 53, was a controlling partner who got into arguments about money and custody following their breakup.
According to the NSW Supreme Court, Dempsey lost his cool when Ms. Sutton expressed her desire to relocate the family from Lithgow to Dubbo.
He drove to her house the morning of the attack and beat her mercilessly, breaking her skull and leaving several cuts on her head, neck, legs, and pelvis.
“This was a brutal and sustained assault that continued for some time and culminated in a ferocious blow to the head,” Justice Hamill stated.
“It was not premeditated, but it was the manifestation of his possessive behaviour.”
Following the assault, Dempsey went to McDonald’s for takeaway and went back to work as a mechanic.
Because the defendant entered a guilty plea before the case went to trial, Justice Hamill informed the court that he would be discounting the jail term by 10%.
Dempsey said his adoptive mother abused and imprisoned him after he was adopted as a toddler, according to testimony given to the court.
He also claimed that a Catholic priest had sexually assaulted him while he was a child.
According to Justice Hamill, Dempsey had a history of drug use and had been found guilty of crimes in Western Australia, including stealing.
“It cannot be said he is a person of prior good character,” he stated.
The judge declared that domestic abuse is unacceptable and that Dempsey must answer for his behaviour.
He sent the family of Ms. Sutton his sympathies.
“No sentence I impose will be enough for them, given the loss they’ve suffered.”
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