The court heard that when the man met the 15-year-old on Grindr, he was in his mid-20s.
The pair began messaging and exchanging photos, and during the course of the messages, the man offered the teen money in exchange for sex.
The teen told the man he was only 15, and despite acknowledging that, the 24-year-old continued to make plans to meet up.
They arranged to meet in a public toilet and engaged in sexual intercourse.
Afterwards, the man gave the teen the money that had been promised.
The judge said it was an “unusual feature” of the offending that once the victim was over 16, the pair maintained an ongoing sexual relationship for “several years”.
It was only after the relationship ended that the victim made a complaint to the police, which explained why the charge was laid four years after the incident.
The judge said the material he’d seen referred to the “transactional nature” of the offence.
“But the very reason why this is an offence, is to protect young people from themselves,” Judge Paul Geoghegan said.
“The law recognises that young people are impulsive, they are risk-taking, they do not often see the consequences of their behaviour.”
This meant there needed to be legislative protection for young people, regardless of whether what happened “was consensual or not”.
The judge also put to one side defence submissions about the context of the sexual intercourse.
“Without getting into the detail, I simply observe that no useful purpose is served by dissecting what actually occurred, and who did what to whom,” Judge Geoghegan said.
He went on to explain that to do that would “undermine” the purpose of the legislation.
A pre-sentence report said at the time of the offending, the man was “exploring his sexuality” and hadn’t given proper consideration to the teen’s age.
The man told the report-writer he’d had a good upbringing, with no violence nor substance abuse.
The report noted the man didn’t have “any rehabilitative needs” – the man was “adamant” he was not sexually attracted to children, and would not engage in sexual contact with a young person again.
It said the man was “genuinely remorseful” and had full and proper insight into the effects of his offending.
He was assessed as having a low risk of reoffending.
The Crown asked for a starting point of around two years’ imprisonment, primarily due to the fact it involved penetrative sex, and the victim’s vulnerability.
However, prosecutor Emily O’Brien accepted that while the victim sat squarely on a “spectrum of vulnerability”, he wasn’t towards “the more egregious end”.
The judge considered the Crown’s submissions adopted too high a starting point.
“There was no breach of trust in this case, and there was no deception,” he said.
While there had been an element of commerciality, that was exactly why the laws exist.
“To protect young people from themselves, from their impulsivity, and from the lack of wisdom in their own decision-making, which is evident in this case.”
The judge agreed with defence lawyer Gizele Schweizer’s starting point of 18 months’ imprisonment.
Schweizer also successfully argued that the man be given permanent name suppression, because of a risk to his safety.
The judge applied a 25% discount for his guilty plea and 5% for previous good character.
The man received an end sentence of six months’ home detention.
Hannah Bartlett is a Tauranga-based Open Justice reporter at NZME. She previously covered court and local government for the Nelson Mail, and before that was a radio reporter at Newstalk ZB.
