Apparently the judge, Peter Bermen, said that "What makes crimes such as those ... particularly frightening is that, realistically, there is nothing that a woman can do to avoid it, short of never being in public alone, a clearly unrealistic alternative", of course this is only because the government won't let them arm themselves.
About the "half-hearted" sentence, according to the ABC's article on this event Judge Bermen went so far as to say that the crime was "brutal and terrifying for the woman" and that an appropriate sentence was needed. So he gave the rapist six to eight years, <sarcasm>seems perfectly appropriate to me.</sarcasm>
