The mother of a former Bendigo teacher facing multiple charges of sexual abuse and grooming of an underage teenager may lose $100,000 which she put up for his bail.
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Former physical education teacher Bryan Keely was initially arrested on August 28 last year after a 15-year-old girl made a statement saying she had been in a sexual relationship with him since around May that year.
Keely, also known as Keely-Russell, was bailed but subsequently rearrested for breaking his bail conditions and reoffending when he continued to contact and exchange explicit content with the girl.
On Wednesday, when the case returned to the Bendigo Magistrates' Court, the court heard Keely's mother was defending an application to forfeit the significant surety.
Initially her son had been charged with 29 offences, including sexual penetration of a child under 16 and sexual assault of a child under 16, and been remanded in custody.
He was bailed on August 29 with the $100,000 surety, and conditions - including an interim family violence order - preventing him from contacting or going near the teenager, her school or home.
Keely continued to contact teenager using mother's iPad
However, on October 5 2023 Senior Constable Isaac Brewster from the Sexual Offences and Child-abuse Investigation Team became aware Keely had been contacting the teenager via Snapchat.
According to police, between September 6 and October 4 he contacted her 63 times on the platform, using an undisclosed iPad belonging to his mother, sending multiple explicit images of himself and receiving explicit images and videos - designated child abuse material - from her, and also met her in person.
Keely was subsequently arrested again and charged with an array of new offences.
Thirty-one new charges included encouraging a child under 16 to engage in a sexual activity while seeking sexual arousal or gratification from the activity, knowingly possessing film and photos depicting a person under 18 years of age engaging in sexual activity, sexually assaulting a child under 16 by intimately kissing them, and contravening a conduct condition of bail.
Explicit messages and expressions of 'love'
An agreed summary of events provided to the court details the numerous Snapchat communications between Keely and the teenager.
As well as sending explicit sexual comments and images, he called her "baby", referred to her as his girlfriend and told her he was in love with her.
"I'd do anything to touch u again," he wrote.
"I'm sooo in love with you."
"You are my amazing girlfriend and I am the luckiest man in the world to have u by my side. I can't wait to spend the rest of my life with you gorgeous."
Despite threat of jail things 'escalated'
According to the victim's evidence, she and Keely discussed the intervention order and the fact he would go back to jail if they were caught talking, but they continued to communicate and things "escalated".
A few days before the Grand Final weekend the teenager met up with Keely and the pair tongue-kissed, hugged and "exchanged 'I love you's' ".
Afterwards, they had planned to meet again, but the victim was "too lazy", according to her statement.
They subsequently exchanged photos and videos with their clothes off.
When he was arrested on October 5 with the iPad hidden behind cushions on a couch Keely at first told police he didn't know the password to the device and gave them a 'no comment' interview.
Later he "became emotional in front of investigators" and told them he had started off being friends with the victim but the relationship had developed and he now loved her.
Keely set to plead guilty to series of charges
On Wednesday, April 17, Keely again appeared in court via videolink from jail.
The court heard the Office of Public Prosecutions had withdrawn a series of charges against him and amended others, and that the accused sex offender would plead guilty to a suite of other charges.
An application for the forfeiture of the $100,000 bond named Jo-Anne Trudie Rusell, Keely's mother, as the respondent.
The court heard that "as a third party to the criminal proceedings, she ha[d] very limited knowledge of the criminal matters, except knowing her son's bail was revoked".
Magistrate Megan Aumair ordered more details be provided on the issue, adjourning the bond matter until September.
An extension of an intervention order prohibiting Keely from contacting the teenager until her 18th birthday in 2026 was granted after he consented to it without making any admission of guilt.
Keely is due to return to court on May 15.
For help and support, contact:
- If someone is in immediate danger, call 000.
- Safe Steps 24-hour crisis line on 1800 015 188
- Centre for Non-violence FREE CALL: 1800 884 292
- Victorian Sexual Assault crisis line, 1800 806 292
- CASACV, 5441 0430
- Lifeline, 13 11 14
