A 26-year-old man has been cleared in Magistrates’ Court of sexually exploiting a girl.

The man, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, denied committing the offence between 2016 and 2018 when he appeared in court last year.

The girl, who is under the age of 14 and also cannot be identified, told the court in February that the man made her touch him sexually at his home in Warwick.

She said she wrote about the alleged incident in a journal, but did not tell her family until 2023 because she felt “scared and disgusted”.

Magistrate Auralee Cassidy said yesterday that she believed the man committed the offence — but did so without understanding his actions owing to a mental impairment, and discharged him from court.

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