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The Press Sex charges faced by a prominent
Canterbury man were substantially altered after a dramatic day in the High
Court in Christchurch yesterday. After an application from the
man's lawyer, Jonathan Eaton, three of the 15 charges against the man, whose
identity is suppressed, were dismissed by Justice Panckhurst. The judge dismissed one charge of
inducing an indecent act and two charges of rape. Insufficient evidence had been
provided to prove an absence of consent regarding the two rape charges, he
said, while the other dismissed count relied on the complainant being under
12 when it was now clear she had been over 12 at the time. Dates in five charges were amended
and another two charges were changed from representative charges to charges
alleging specific acts. Opening the defence case
yesterday, Eaton said the complainant's allegations were "quite
bizarre" and "inherently unlikely". She had been hopelessly
inconsistent and seemed to think all she needed to do was allege sex happened
and the rest did not matter, he said. Where records existed, they tended
to show the complainant's memories were unreliable, Eaton said. His client had a close
relationship with the complainant and she had a bit of a crush on him. When she was 16 or 17, one act of
consensual intercourse had occurred, and it was probably the worst mistake of
his client's life. The defendant's wife would give
evidence she had never seen anything untoward between her husband and the
complainant, and the complainant's mother would tell the court she had no
recall of her daughter coming to her about a pregnancy test as alleged. The defendant took the stand
yesterday denying that any of the events that resulted in charges had
occurred. "Absolutely not," he
said, when the events were put to him. On at least three occasions, the
complainant had connected alleged incidents of sexual abuse with vehicles
that he did not own at the time, he said. The penultimate Crown witness,
Leigh Steele, told the court yesterday of her schoolgirl disbelief when the
complainant, then her third-form friend, talked about anal sex with the
accused. Steele, a surprise witness,
contacted the police on Monday last week after reading about the case. She said she had been friends with
the complainant during their high school years in Christchurch. "I was 13, in third form,
when I learnt about anal sex. She told me it happened with (the accused) and
that it hurt. I did not believe it could happen. I questioned someone
else." Steele said she could
"picture the conversation" but not the timeframe. The complainant had talked about
other sexual episodes with the accused. These included sex on a picnic table,
in the back of a Range Rover and on the way back from a ski accident in which
she suffered a broken ankle, Steele said. "I believe she was infatuated
with (the accused). She wasn't upset like the other time. I believed she
truly believed (the accused) cared about her. He was nice to her. He was good
to her," Steele said. The complainant had told other
girls and spoke as though "it was secretive". "Almost like it was a bit
exciting. We laughed and giggled about things like this," Steele said. The stories came out in
conversation, she said. She had been in touch with the
complainant in 2004 and knew she was taking a case against the accused, but
not the details. |
