A FORMER colleague of notorious Department of Youth and Community Services senior manager Frank Valentine said he had no doubt there were more Valentine child sex victims in the community silenced for decades by his crimes.
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Some may be in the Hunter.
"I have no doubt there are other victims out there. I would say to them, now that it's known Frank was a sexual predator, seek help. It's not too late to be able to be more at peace about what happened," said Max Morrissey, who was a Hunter child protection consultant reporting to Valentine in the late 1980s.
Valentine, 78, was jailed for 22 years on Friday, with a minimum sentence of 13 years, for crimes against six teenage victims, male and female, at NSW Government youth facilities.
The crimes occurred over three years in the early to mid 1970s, before Valentine was appointed to Kurri Kurri's Yawarra Training School for troubled teenage boys, and later as Department of Youth and Community Services Hunter operations manager, or second-in-charge, in the late 1980s.
Sydney District Court Judge Nicole Norman said Valentine's crimes "mostly reflect opportunistic offending, in that the offender probably did not plan any particular occasion or particular sexual act until the opportunity presented itself".
"The offender took advantage of a victim when and how he pleased given the power imbalance," Judge Norman said.
Mr Morrissey, a Charles Sturt University academic, said the 22-year sentence was "eminently reasonable".
"I'm pleased it might bring some level of comfort to people who were abused by someone who was supposed to be caring for them," he said.
"He took advantage of the most vulnerable of young people. I can't say I'm sorry that it's likely he will die in jail. I don't think anyone could challenge the justice of it."
Judge Norman said the impact of the crimes on Valentine's victims had been profound and lifelong. Victims were raped at Valentine's home after meeting his wife and children, at youth facilities and on trips.
Mr Morrissey said it was impossible to "get inside the head of someone like Frank to know what happened to him".
"What drives a person down that road?"
Valentine's jail sentence expires on May 23, 2041.
The Department of Family and Community Services declined to provide details of Valentine's history in the Hunter region, including when he worked at Yawarra or whether he worked at Worimi Shelter at Broadmeadow, which operated from 1966 to 2006 as a reception facility for children facing court.