Nicholas Visser: Former WAFL assistant coach and high school teacher loses student sex abuse conviction appeal

A former teacher who persistently sexually abused a teenage student on school grounds has lost his bid to overturn his conviction, as the State seeks to increase his jail term. Nicholas Visser was 28 when he first started offending against the 15-year-old in 2019, molesting her on six separate occasions over eight and a half months. He also sent her indecent photos and videos of himself — continuing to do so when she said she did not want them and recording himself repeatedly saying her name in one vile piece of footage. When the school got new bicycles, he asked another teacher to release her from class, saying they would assemble them in the shed, but used the opportunity to touch her inappropriately and forced her to do the same to him. On another occasion, she was meant to be helping him with lifejackets when he preyed upon her. When she turned 16 in 2020, he gave her a “birthday hug” and again forced her to touch him. Another offence involved him confiscating a ball she had been playing with, later placing it down his shorts and telling her to retrieve it. Visser left the girl feeling confused by punishing her and threatening her with detention. And when an investigation into his conduct began, he told the teen to deny he had done anything wrong. His WA Court of Appeal judgment was handed down on Friday, detailing five grounds, including that the jury’s verdicts were unreasonable or unsupported by the evidence. Visser took aim at the victim — pointing to what he described as shortcomings in her evidence — saying it was improbable that she would continue to meet with him if his attention was unwanted. Justices Robert Mazza, Gail Archer and Stephen Hall said she had explained that she did not know what else to do. “It is relevant to consider the power imbalance between a teacher and a student, an imbalance that was evident when the appellant sought to embarrass the complainant by requiring her to tie his shoelaces, fetch his chair and do push-ups in his class,” the judges wrote. “The complainant also gave explanations for why she did not tell her friends or family. “It is now well understood that victims of sexual offending will often be reluctant to report it due to embarrassment or fear of the consequences. “In our own independent assessment of the sufficiency and quality of the evidence, we are not left with a reasonable doubt as to the appellant’s guilt.” Visser was handed a jail term of four and a half years in February 2024 and will be eligible for parole after serving two years and six months. “That sentence is the subject of a pending State appeal,” the judgment revealed.