The Nelson Mail
April 19 2007
Jury acquits man of rape
A man accused of raping his former partner in her Nelson home while her children slept upstairs has been found not guilty by a jury.
The 44-year-old man, who has permanent name suppression, hugged his supporters and lawyers after the verdict in the Nelson District Court yesterday .
He had denied two charges of rape and one of having unlawful sexual connection with the complainant on November 24, 2005.
His trial began in the Nelson District Court on Monday .
The jury of six men and six women took 2<<1/2>>hours to reach its verdict.
The Crown alleged that the woman did not consent to the sex and did not call the police via a silent alarm because she feared that the man would become violent.
Two charges of breaching a protection order were dropped during the trial because protection order documentation had not been delivered to the man personally.
At the end of his court appearance yesterday, the man admitted a separate charge of threatening to kill. He was convicted and discharged by Judge Tony Zohrab because he had already spent time in custody.
Speaking outside court, defence lawyer Miharo Armstrong said the man was very pleased with the verdict.
"He wants to move on and get on with his life,'' Mr Armstrong said.
Judge Zohrab told the jurors before they began deliberating to put aside any preconceptions they had about the case and the current public debate about rape cases and false complaints.
Judge Zohrab thanked the jurors for their service .
The Nelson Mail
April 18 2007
Woman 'asked for goodnight kiss'
A man accused of raping his former partner has told a Nelson court that he had been drinking heavily on the day of the alleged offending and had previously threatened to kill the woman.
The 44-year-old man, who has interim name suppression, has denied two counts of rape and one of unlawful sexual connection. He is on trial in the Nelson District Court.
The Crown alleges the man raped the woman at her Nelson house on November 24, 2005, while her children slept upstairs.
The jury was expected to begin deliberating on Wednesday.
The accused, who now lives in the North Island, also faced two charges of breaching a protection order, but they were dropped on Tuesday after it was revealed that the protection order documentation had not been served to him personally.
Giving evidence on Tuesday, the man said he spent November 24 in Motueka visiting family he had not seen for a long time, and began drinking beer at 8am.
He was ``drunk as'' when he returned to his Nelson flat between 5.30pm and 6pm that day, so went to bed.
He said when he woke at 10.30pm, and felt a lot better, he biked to the complainant's house because he wanted to have a cigarette with her. The pair had been in and out of a relationship for several years.
The man said after talking, smoking and drinking tea in her carport for a few hours, he helped her take the cups to the kitchen. He said she then asked him for a goodnight kiss, and the pair embraced, and then had sex twice and oral sex once, in the lounge.
The man said the woman did not give any physical or verbal indications that she did not want him there.
He admitted under cross examination by Crown prosecutor Janine Bonifant that he had threatened to kill and do harm to the complainant in the past.
"That was a couple of years before the current incident and it effectively severed the relationship,'' he said.
In her closing address, Ms Bonifant said the complainant made ``honest concessions'' to the jury when she gave evidence about the evening and her background.
"She told you that warts and all, because she was an honest person. I suggest it isn't a hallmark of a liar to tell you less flattering aspects.''
The complainant was so fearful of her former partner, and the consequences of police arriving, that she did not use a silent panic alarm to alert police to his presence, she said.
Ms Bonifant said the law said just because a woman did not offer protest or physical resistance it did not mean she consented to sexual activity, and there was no consent if there was a threat, ``either expressed or implied'', or force.
Defence lawyer Miharo Armstrong told the jury the defendant was honest and had been open about previously threatening to kill his former partner.
Mr Armstrong said the defendant had "by and large'' sobered up before going to the woman's house, and had always denied raping her.
"He couldn't have been aware that the complainant didn't consent because all her actions and body movements indicated to him that she wanted to do it just as much as he did.''
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The Nelson Mail
April 17 2007
Woman 'too scared' to stop rape
A Nelson mother was too frightened to activate a police-installed panic alarm when her former partner allegedly breached a protection order and raped her in her home, a court has heard.
The woman, who cannot be named, gave evidence during the first day of a trial in the Nelson District Court on Monday.
Her former partner, on trial before Judge Tony Zohrab and a jury of six men and six women, denied two charges of rape, two of breaching a protection order and one of unlawful sexual connection.
The 44-year-old man, who now lives in the North Island, has interim name suppression.
In opening the Crown case, prosecutor Janine Bonifant alleged the offending took place on November 24, 2005 at the woman's home as her children, and a teenager, slept upstairs.
Ms Bonifant said the woman had a protection order against the accused.
The woman did not want to have sex with the man but complied with his demands out of fear, Ms Bonifant said.
The complainant told the court she had been in an ``on and off'' relationship with the man for several years, and had children to him.
She said the man phoned her at 5pm on November 24 asking to come around, but she refused. As she headed to bed at 11pm, he knocked at her door. She asked him to leave and he said he ``just wanted to have a cigarette''.
The woman said she went upstairs and got her cigarettes and a pendant alarm, which would silently contact police if activated.
"I tucked (the pendant) into my clothes because I didn't want him to see it.
"I thought that he would spin out and get angry if he saw it.''
She eventually opened the door to the man, and went outside with him to the carport where they talked for a few hours, she said.
The woman said she told the accused she did not want to have sex with him, she wanted to go to bed, and she wanted him to leave.
She said she had been trying to change her life.
"He was going to have sex with me regardless of what I was saying,'' she said.
"I started freaking a bit inside. I was worried and nervous. I started to realise what was actually going down.
"I just gave in because I knew he was going to anyway.''
She said she was raped twice, and forced to perform oral sex once, over a few hours.
"It wasn't a violent rape because I went with it. If I hadn't, it would have been.''
Under cross-examination by the man's lawyer Louis Te Kani, the complainant admitted sending a letter to the accused a few months after she got the protection order against him in 2003.
In the letter, a part of which was read to the court, she indicated she thought taking the defendant's last name through marriage ``had a nice ring to it''.
The accused had a good side and she once wanted to be a family, she said.
She admitted having sex with the accused twice in 2005 before the alleged rapes, but said she then ``severed'' all contact with him.
She agreed with Mr Te Kani's suggestion that she had ample opportunity to alert police to an unwelcome visitor, but said there were several reasons she didn't.
"I thought he (the accused) would make a damn good job at hurting me before getting arrested.''
She admitted making the accused two cups of tea while they talked in the carport and that they had kissed, but denied the sex was consensual.
The trial continued on Tuesday.
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