A jury has found an Alice Springs man accused of sexually assaulting and raping his foster daughter not guilty of all charges.
The 46-year-old man pleaded not guilty to three counts of aggravated assault and one count of sexual intercourse without consent.
The prosecution argued the accused had inappropriately touched his then-17-year-old daughter on multiple occasions inside the family home.
The man was also accused of raping her at a holiday house, at a twin-share hotel room and at the family home.
The alleged victim gave evidence last week before a closed court to protect her identity.
The court heard she first made allegations to a school counsellor in May 2020.
The accused's wife and a friend of the family, who said she also had a "very special bond" with the alleged victim, both gave evidence during the trial.
They separately told the jury that the young woman had told them the allegations she had made against her foster father were untrue.
She was removed from the family home by Territory Families after her conversation with the school counsellor, but the court heard she later retracted her allegations and returned to live with the family.
"It's pretty clear, and certainly the impression conveyed by [the alleged victim] is that she was in a world of trouble as a result of her saying what she said to the counsellor, and that the only way for her to get out of that trouble was to retract," prosecutor David Dalrymple told the jury in his closing remarks.
The defence argued the alleged victim had fabricated the allegations because she had been having friendship problems at school and needed a reason to go to the counsellor's office during class time.
"She wanted to get out of class and in order to do so, she told probably the most terrible story a child could tell against a parent," defence barrister Stephen Robson SC said.
The court heard the young woman made new allegations of sexual misconduct against her father in October and November 2020.
Mr Robson argued she had a tense relationship with her foster parents at this time because they disapproved of her then boyfriend, and that she continued to "throw" allegations against her foster father around "like confetti at a wedding".
"Despite perhaps what you might have heard in the media or social media, we're not in some new kind of age of enlightenment, where an allegation of sexual conduct need only to be made to be accepted as true and accurate," Mr Robson said in his closing remarks.
The accused and members of his family in the public gallery cried while the jury delivered its verdict on Friday afternoon.
