A retired dentist has been jailed for a second time for sexually molesting girls and young women while they were under the influence of nitrous oxide gas at his Jannali surgery.
On Monday in the District Court in Parramatta, Judge Chris Craigie set a minimum term of three years for Rodger Garry Leighton, 81, who pleaded guilty to molesting five girls and three women between 1974 and 1983.
The same judge jailed him last year after a jury found Leighton guilty of indecently assaulting four other girls who were also patients at his shire surgery.
The judge set a maximum term of eight years, which is partially accumulative on his previous sentence - meaning he will be eligible for release on parole in March 2019.
He stressed that he was bound by penalties applicable at the time of the offending, penalties which were now much tougher for such crimes.
Leighton's "predatory sexual behaviour" involved him sexually molesting patients while they were under the influence of so-called laughing gas.
He administered the gas under "the pretence it was solely for the purpose of legitimate dental treatment", but it also facilitated his opportunistic offending for his own sexual gratification.
"For some 40 years, the offender has been unpunished" while his victims had been reliving the humiliation and distress he caused them, the judge said.
Leighton continued on with his life, with the social status and standing in the community that was given to professionals such as him.
AAP
