Former fine-dining apprentice Joshua Moore was sentenced for carjacking and sexually assaulting a woman in Narrandera. (Facebook)
A former fine-dining chef who pleaded guilty to aggravated sexual assault and carjacking has been called a "selfish, sick individual" by his victim in court.
Joshua Samson Moore, 26, was sentenced in Wagga Wagga District Court today over the carjacking and sexual assault of the then-52-year-old woman in Narrandera in southern New South Wales.
Moore appeared in Wagga Wagga District court via AVL link, where he came face to face with his victim who was in attendance today.
Judge Gordon Lerve handed down a sentence of six years and four months with a four-year non-parole period, over the November 2021 attack.
The court heard on the morning of the attack, Moore attended a Narrandera Medical Centre looking for methamphetamines and threatened an employee with a brick, before fleeing to the car park.
The victim, whose identity is legally withheld, was in a vehicle nearby when Moore entered her passenger side, swore at her and ordered her to drive.
The court heard the woman, a mother and grandmother, was taken to an isolated location near the river outside of Narrandera, where Moore forced her to perform oral sex on him.
She escaped the car and was taken back to town by the driver of a ute parked nearby.
Moore was arrested by police a short time later, and also pleaded guilty and was sentenced over charges of assaulting police officers and demanding property with menace.
'He ruined my dreams'
In a victim impact statement read ahead of sentencing, the victim said she suffered physical trauma from the attack with swelling so bad she was worried she would suffocate in her sleep.
"My jaw on both sides was bruised and swollen," she said.
She said she had been unable to return to her work since and "became a prisoner in her own home" unable to leave the house or drive for months.
"I experience nightmares and flashbacks," she said.
"There is not a day that I don't feel emotionally overwhelmed, isolated and scared to leave my house.
"For me this is a life sentence."
The victim concluded saying her life had changed forever.
"Now I know the world is dark and through one selfish individual by the name of Joshua, my plans have been destroyed.
"He has created fear in my life, he has eliminated the future I once planned and he destroyed my dreams."
Former chef 'unlikely to reoffend'
Magistrate Gordon Lerve sentenced Moore in Wagga Wagga District Court today (ABC Riverina: Monty Jacka)
In his judgement, Justice Lerve said the incident was terrifying for the victim but he took into account special circumstances surrounding the attack.
The court heard Moore expressed remorse over the incident, stating in an affidavit he was "off my head, I was so out of it".
He had been taking the drug ice daily in the week leading up to the attack and was under the influence at the time, and had complex mental illnesses stemming from a violent childhood.
Moore was formerly an apprentice chef at well-known fine dining restaurant Bistro Guillaume in Sydney, but the court heard he left the industry three months before his apprenticeship was finished.
Judge Lerve found in his sentencing Moore was unlikely to reoffend.
He will be eligible for parole in November 2025.
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