A man sentenced to prison in the Tauranga District Court for various sexual offences has had his appeal against his conviction and sentence thrown out.

The man, whose name cannot be published due to suppression orders, went to the Court of Appeal in Wellington after he was sentenced in 2013 to 14 years and nine months in jail with a minimum non-parole period of 7.5 years.

A man is serving a 14 year prison sentence for sexual offences which took place in Te Puke and Hamilton.

The convicted offender was found guilty of assault with intent to commit sexual violation, one count of rape, and one representative count of rape, two representative charges of doing an indecent act and one representative charge of sexual violation by digital penetration. A representative charge means the same offence took place more than once.

According to court documents, the offences took place between 2007 and 2011 in Hamilton and Te Puke against the daughter of the man's partner. The victim was aged between nine and 13-years-old when the offending took place.

The offending stopped when the girl went to live with her aunts in 2011. This is when she told them what had happened and a police investigation was launched.

When interviewed by the police, the convicted offender denied any wrongdoing. His defence at trial was that nothing of a sexual nature had ever taken place between him and the girl.

Following the trial and subsequent sentence, the man lodged an appeal citing:

There had been a miscarriage of justice warranting a retrial. He based that argument on: the cumulative effect of numerous alleged trial counsel errors (the principal ground of appeal); the trial Judge's refusal to allow cross-examination of the victim and her boyfriend regarding the full extent of their sexual relationship; and fresh evidence from a police document examiner.

After reviewing the appeal evidence and the trial documents, the Court of Appeal dismissed the case.

'In our view, none of the grounds of the appeal advanced are sustainable.”