Restaurateur gets 9 years for drugging young men

An Auckland restaurant owner has been jailed for nine years for giving young men drugs in order to have sex with them.

One of David Philip Sturm's victims had been a lost soul ever since and was still deeply distressed, a judge said today.

Sturm was jailed for nine years in the High Court in Auckland today on five charges of sexual violation and one of using drugs to stupefy his victims so he could have sex with them.

He had earlier been found guilty by a jury at the second trial he faced on the charges.

In his sentencing remarks, Justice Hugh Williams told Sturm it was a deplorable crime and the victim Sturm had anal sex with had been affected in a catastrophic way.

He had given up his tertiary education and since the incident had been a lost soul. He was still deeply traumatised several years after the event.

It was the second time Sturm had been on trial on the charges after the Court of Appeal ordered a new trial when both Sturm's lawyer and the Crown appealed.

Sturm claimed his trial had been tainted and the Crown said the trial judge should not have told the jury it could not convict Sturm on stupefying charges.

Sturm was appearing for sentencing on five charges of sexual violation and one of stupefying, involving three victims.

On the charge involving the victim with whom Sturm had had anal intercourse, he was jailed for nine years and on the other sexual violation and stupefying charge, he was jailed for seven and a half years. The terms were to be served concurrently with no minimum term imposed.

The judge told Sturm two juries had found there was no consent from any of the victims.

Victim impact reports were not up to date because none of the victims had wanted anything more to do with the case, he said.

None of the victims knew each other and in spite of two trials none of the victims had met, he said.

He said Sturm had set up Cibos and Ottos restaurants in Auckland.

One victim had drunk so much in November, 2003, that he was comatose but at 4am he awoke and began walking along Great North Road.

Sturm did not know him but had picked up him up in his Porsche and had taken him to his office in the city where he gave him drugs and alcohol to the point where he was stupefied.

He was out of control, powerless, and incapable of resisting, said the judge.

"He was unable to do anything but go along with anything you suggested."

He ordered that $10,000 reparation Sturm had paid into the court be divided equally among the three victims or to whichever victims would accept it.

- NZPA