A Melbourne County Court jury has found 24-year-old convicted murderer Lachlan Young not guilty of raping a teenager, concluding a trial that was subject to strict legal safeguards to prevent his prior conviction from prejudicing the proceedings. The verdict, delivered on August 20, 2026, clears Young of a sexual assault charge dating back to February 2024, just two months before he murdered his girlfriend, Hannah McGuire, in a high-profile case that shocked the Ballarat community.
The Legal Separation of the Trials
To ensure a fair trial, the jury in the rape case was not informed that Young was already serving a 28-year prison sentence for McGuire’s murder. Under Victorian legal standards, prior convictions are highly restricted in active trials to prevent jurors from assuming guilt based on past behavior. To protect the integrity of the proceedings, the court also imposed a strict suppression order, barring the media from reporting on Young’s murder conviction while the rape trial was underway. This gag order was formally lifted immediately after the jury delivered its not guilty verdict.
During the trial, lawyers and prosecutors were legally prohibited from referencing Hannah McGuire by name, ensuring that the jury evaluated the sexual assault charge purely on the evidence presented in the courtroom.
Conflicting Accounts of the Incident
The charge stemmed from an incident on February 5, 2024, at a property in Sebastopol, Ballarat, belonging to Young’s neighbor. The complainant, who was 16 at the time, testified that she met Young that evening and agreed to some consensual sexual touching in the backyard after others had gone to sleep. However, she maintained that Young forced her to have sexual intercourse against her will when she refused his further advances.
Young took the witness stand to deny the allegation, testifying, “That did not happen.” He claimed that the sexual activity stopped immediately when the teenager informed him of her age. Young told the court that he initiated the halt because he had a partner at home and realized he was doing the wrong thing. “I had a partner at home. I was doing the wrong thing and it shouldn’t have got to that stage and I pulled it up,” he stated.
Timeline of the Allegations and Arrest
The prosecution presented evidence showing that the teenager confided in a friend the morning after the incident and later confronted Young via Snapchat messaging. In one message sent the following week, she wrote: “How’s ya Missus, how would she feel about u f***ing an underage and cheating on her.” Young replied, “What are you on about?”
The teenager subsequently reported the incident to a school counselor, leading to an official police report on April 2, 2024. Just three days later, on April 5, Young murdered Hannah McGuire at her home before torching her body inside a vehicle. He was arrested by the homicide squad on April 7, 2024, and was formally charged with the rape five months later, while already in custody for the murder.
Young is currently held at Barwon Prison. His 28-year murder sentence will remain unchanged by this verdict, with his earliest opportunity for parole scheduled for August 2046.