Father jailed for incest in Victoria

An elderly man has been sentenced to seven years in prison for raping his daughters and four of their friends 40 years ago.

The 79-year-old was sentenced on Friday to a maximum of seven years after pleading guilty to nine child sex offences in Victoria during the 1970s.

"The sentence must indicate to would-be offenders that the passage of time between offending and sentence does not excuse it," Judge James Montgomery told the County Court of Victoria.

The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, pleaded guilty to sexually abusing two of his daughters and four other girls.

The father was aged 35 when he started abusing the girls in 1972.

He abused the victims, aged between 10 and 15, until 1978.

During that time he threatened to put one of the girls in a children's home if she told anyone about what was happening, the Crown said in its sentencing submissions.

The father breached his daughters' trust by preying on them and their friends.

The daughters' anguish over what happened to them was compounded by a mother who did not protect them because she did not want to choose sides, the Crown said.

The father was one of 13 children, the court heard.

He and his sisters were sexually abused as children by their older brothers.

Judge Montgomery said the man would have been subject to a 10-year sentence had he not pleaded guilty.