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peterellis Home / abuse allegations / Peter Stewart Peter Stewart - News
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The Press Having sex on his boat with a
teenager was the biggest mistake of his life, a prominent Canterbury man
says. When he confessed to his wife 27
years later, he saw his decades-long marriage going down the drain, the man
told the High Court in Christchurch yesterday as he fought back tears. The man, whose name, occupation
and age are suppressed, is defending 12 charges that he sexually abused the
Christchurch complainant from when she was aged eight or nine to late in her
teens. He denies all the charges but
admits having sex with the complainant on one occasion in the mid-1970s on a
boat in the Marlborough Sounds when she was 17. Concluding his testimony
yesterday, he said the encounter occurred after a family fishing trip after
his wife and children had returned to their beach house. "She was horsing around and
she had on a brief white bikini," he said. "She had a crush on me and
she made overtures to me and at that point I made the biggest mistake of my
life and we had sex. Looking back, God knows why it happened. "It never happened again. I
made a mistake. A big mistake. I just knew it was bad news." He never told anybody about the
incident because he was ashamed, he said. His relationship with the girl had
carried on as usual after the incident. In 2003, he had met the
complainant in her workplace and she had become extremely distraught. She
told him she wanted him to leave. In the year following his wife had
confronted him with an allegation he had had sex with the complainant, then a
schoolgirl, just after she broke her leg skiing. "I was stunned. `It's not
true,' I said." His wife asked if he had had sex
with the complainant and he confessed to the boat encounter. "She called me a disgusting
bastard," he told the court. His wife had been distressed and
he had driven off in his truck to clear his head. "All I could see was my
lifetime of marriage and bringing up beautiful children going out the door.
We had created big businesses. Could all be lost just like that?" he
said. Later, his stepmother had become
involved in meetings with the complainant and it was from her he heard more
about the allegations against him. After lawyers became active he
also learnt the complainant wanted a house in Merivale or Fendalton and her
son's school fees paid as compensation. His stepmother, who had helped
many members of the family over the years, had offered the complainant a
house but he had no involvement in the offer, he said. An "issue of jealousy"
existed between the complainant and his wife, who was talented and
successful, he said. "(The complainant) always
seemed to have nothing and my wife had everything. It always caused
disruption and continued all our married life," he said. The man's wife, an accomplished
businesswoman, said she had never seen or suspected sexual activity between
the complainant and her husband in the many years the complainant had been
connected with her family. She clearly had a crush on her
husband but it never appeared to her to be anything more. "If I suspected anything, I
assure you I would have done something about it," she said. The woman was envious of her
lifestyle and "things I've done". She had tried to help her in every
way, she said. She had detected no change in the
complainant's attitude towards her husband from high school to 2004. The
woman was demonstrative to men, very attractive and could be a lot of fun. In evidence read to the court, the
complainant's elderly mother said she had no recollection of taking a urine
sample from the complainant, who was then still young, to a doctor for a
pregnancy test. The complainant had told her it
had happened, but she had no memory of it. |
