Former Moonee Valley mayor sentenced to three months in prison for sexually assaulting teen

A former mayor has been sentenced to three months’ prison and an 18-month community correction order after pleading guilty to sexually assaulting a teenage boy seven years ago.

Cameron Nation, a former mayor at the City of Moonee Valley, was sentenced on Thursday over a single charge of sexual assault of a child aged 16 or 17 under his care, supervision or authority.

The Age can report the details of the case after several media outlets successfully fought to revoke a suppression order that was first placed over the matter in December last year.

The incident occurred in December 2019, and Nation was charged by police in October last year. He pleaded guilty to the charge at a court appearance earlier this month.

Nation sobbed in the front row of the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court as magistrate Michelle Mykytowycz handed down her decision on Thursday. He was taken into custody after the hearing.

Defence lawyer Sam Norton indicated to the court his intention to appeal the sentence and seek bail for his client.

The court heard that Nation was formerly a director and head coach of three aquatic clubs in Melbourne’s north-west. He met the victim when the victim was eight or nine years old and was training as a competitive swimmer.

The victim later gained casual employment as an assistant swim coach between November 2018 until March 2020 while still a teenager, where Nation acted as his boss.

Nation and the victim initially began communicating over text and via social media after the former mayor got in touch to congratulate the teenager for “coming out” as gay.

This progressed to discussions that were sometimes of a sexual nature. The prosecution said this included Nation expressing interest in taking the victim to a gay club to “show him the ropes”.

The teenage boy later told police that this correspondence made him feel there were “no real professional boundaries between us, and it made me trust him more”.

The sexual assault took place in the early hours of the morning on December 15 at Nation’s residence, after the victim had been attending a nearby house party.

Nation, then aged 36, invited the 17-year-old back to his house for “kick-ons”, where the pair inhaled nitrous oxide in the living room.

“This made me feel really spaced out, like I had no control over my body,” the victim later told police.

The court heard that Nation kissed the victim, before pulling down the teenager’s pants and sexually assaulting him.

“I did not know what to do … I felt like I had no control,” the victim said to police.

Nation was a Moonee Valley councillor at the time of the offending but resigned during a meeting in March 2024 after more than 11 years of service.

In August 2023, he and other councillors had their homes raided as part of a corruption investigation by the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission (IBAC). He faced no criminal charges related to that investigation.

Nation was charged over the sexual assault in October 2025. There were initially additional charges, but they were ultimately dropped by the prosecution.

Mykytowycz said the offence “involved a breach of trust” of a vulnerable young person and considered it a “serious example” of sexual touching.

“[It] involved you violating the body … of the complainant for your own sexual gratification,” she said, adding that she saw a period of imprisonment as the only suitable sentence.

Nation’s defence lawyer, Sam Norton, in court on Thursday pushed for the suppression order to remain in place and for a new suppression order to be granted for a period of two years.

This was opposed by a legal representative for several media outlets and the Office of Public Prosecutions.

Norton said his client had severe mental health issues – including being admitted to hospital following a suicide attempt in November last year – which had been exacerbated by media reporting.

But Mykytowycz said she found no clear causal link between Nation’s declining mental health and the publication of articles in the media.

At the previous committal mention on September 18, Norton successfully fought to have the incident downgraded to a summary offence.

This meant the sentencing was heard in the Magistrates’ Court rather than the County Court, and reduced the maximum sentence able to be handed down.

Nation will be listed as a registered sex offender for eight years.

Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.