Cameron Carter wanted revenge on a paedophile, so he stomped his head against a rock and left him unconscious in Magpie bushland.
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The Sebastopol teenage vigilante helped take the 20-year-old sex offender hostage before bashing and dumping him on a dirt track and leaving him there in darkness.
Carter, 19, and three other people became enraged after they found out the man had abused his own four-year-old niece.
The group lured him to a meeting at a Ballarat park in August 2018, punched him to the ground and forced him into a car, where the attack continued.
Carter, a 16-year-old boy, and Toni Cunningham and Brian Johnston drove their victim to a dirt track, where Carter stomped on the victim's head and pushed it against a nearby rock.
This was serious offending. A man was taken, badly intimidated and assaulted .. and then left significantly injured and unconscious
- Judge Michael Bourke
The three males continued to assault the man while Cunningham remained in the car, not looking at the bashing, with the music turned up.
The pedophile was left unconscious but survived and made his way to a nearby property for help. He suffered a brain haemorrhage, fractured nose and hand.
In October, he was jailed for nine years with a non-parole period of five-and-a-half years, for sexually penetrating and sexually assaulting the girl.
The day after the bashing, Carter told police "I didn't wanna (sic) kill him but I wanted to mess him up enough so he learned his lesson".
Now 20, the vigilante has avoided adult jail after pleading guilty to false imprisonment, intentionally causing injury and breaching bail.
Carter was sentenced in the County Court of Victoria on Friday to spend nine months in youth justice detention.
Judge Michael Bourke accepted Carter and his friends were enraged the man had sexually abused a child.
"It was clear that there were serious sexual assaults and I accept that there was much distress and understandable anger at the discovery (of the sexual abuse)," Judge Bourke said.
"This was serious offending. A man was taken, badly intimidated and assaulted .. and then left significantly injured and unconscious in what must be seen as a remote place."
Carter, Cunningham and Johnston each pleaded guilty to intentionally causing injury and false imprisonment at the County Court at Ballarat in November.
Cunningham and Johnston, of Mount Pleasant, are awaiting further plea at a date to be fixed. Their 16-year-old co-accused was sentenced to a 12-month good behaviour bond at a Children's Court in 2019.
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