There's an account of this case in the Geelong Advertiser where the facts of the case differ substantially from those of the Pickering Post. For a start the Magistrate did not hear the case, and in all likelihood was not going to hear the case. He's offered a legal opinion at a committal hearing. The most likely "cultural difference" referred to is not that Afghans are allowed to abduct and sexually assault children, but that it's not uncommon for an Afghan man to approach a child not from their family. That's not to say that the Afghan man's motives were pure, merely that the magistrate didn't think the police could prove the charge. The police apparently agreed with him.
