A woman claims a high-profile Sydney man told her he “didn’t mean” to when he allegedly raped her and then told her that other women had “accused him of the same,” a court has heard.
“I said he didn’t get to decide it if was rape or not,” the woman, known as complainant three, told the court. “He apologised and he said that he loved me and that he didn’t mean to rape me.”
The woman told the court the man said this to her after she had gone to his house and confronted him for allegedly raping her two and a half years earlier. While there, they spoke about his alleged drug use issues and that he would go to rehab.
She had not reported the incident to police, but then later did after she realised “nothing [would] change”.
“I could tell he wasn’t going to detox or rehab,” she told the court.
The woman is the third complainant out of six to appear before the New South Wales Downing Centre district court in a trial expected to last 10 weeks. She follows the second complainant who alleged the man indecently assaulted her, and the first complainant who alleged the man had raped her while she was his intern.
The man, who Guardian Australia cannot name due to a suppression order, is facing trial after pleading not guilty to 12 charges – which include six counts of rape – alleged to have occurred over a six-year period against six women on separate occasions. The crown is arguing the man had a tendency to carry out sexual conduct with usually much younger females, knowing that they did not consent or that he was reckless to their consent.
The man’s defence argues there was sex with the five women who have alleged he raped them. However, his defence argues, the sex was consensual, “not in the circumstances alleged by the crown”, and that the complainants “admired the accused, even idolised him”.
The woman told the court the pair had had sex twice before he allegedly raped her.
“He started initiating sex and I remember thinking that this time I have to say no, I can’t be an idiot I have to say no, and I said no, and I said no audibly, and he started to have sex with me and then I started crying and said it was hurting me,” she told the court.
The year before the alleged rape, complainant three and the man had sex the first time, the court heard. She was 19 at the time.
She told the court she had gone to his house to hang out and wanted to speak about doing an apprenticeship with him. They had sex at his home after drinking some wine and the woman felt “very intoxicated”.
Asked by crown prosecutor Adrian Robertson how she felt when they had sex, the woman said she was uncomfortable.
“But I didn’t communicate [it] and I acknowledge that,” she told the court. She added she felt “confused” because “we had spoken about an apprenticeship earlier but [I] didn’t want to mess it up”.
After they had sex, he blocked her on social media, the court heard.
The police informed the woman two years after she had made her first statement that the man had allegedly filmed the pair having sex, the court heard. The woman alleged it was without her consent or knowledge.
On the second occasion they had sex, they were at his home. She told him she just wanted to be friends and didn’t want a sexual relationship. After the conversation, they went upstairs to watch a movie and he initiated sex with her.
“He started touching me and asked if we could have sex, and I said, ‘Remember what we talked about downstairs?’ And he got really sulky again … I said as a follow-up, ‘I have my period’, but he said, ‘That’s OK’,” she told the court.
“Did you want to have sex?” asked Robertson.
“In my mind, no. But I didn’t say it. I didn’t say it … because I couldn’t understand why he agreed with me downstairs but then upstairs he changed his mind.”
She told the court she expressed concern to the man afterwards that he didn’t use a condom. She claimed he responded: “We would make beautiful children.”
He later blocked her again on social media. “How did that make you feel?” asked Robertson.
“Stupid, and ashamed,” she told the court.
The man is not facing charges for the first or second episodes of sexual activity.
The day complainant three alleges the man raped her, she had helped him buy Christmas gifts, the court heard.
Later, while at his home, she asked the accused if he could get her an Uber home. He asked her to stay the night and said she could sleep in the spare bedroom.
She told the court that because others were in the home, “he wouldn’t do anything to me, so it was safe to stay”.
The woman said after she had gone to bed, the accused came into the room and said the other people in the house were “asleep now”.
“How were you feeling when he got into bed with you?” asked Robertson.
“Just like, I’m just an idiot, and I just knew I was an idiot,” she told the court.
Robertson then asked the woman why she thought she was an idiot.
“Because … I believed him, and I’d done all these nice things and I didn’t think he would lie to me.”
“Did you consent to him?” Robertson asked.
“No, I said no, and I said I was in pain and I was crying,” the woman told the court.
“This time I said no, this time I said no.”
Robertson asked what the man did after she said no.
“Nothing, he just keep going.”
The trial continues. The witness remains on the stand.
