A MOTHER of three yesterday told a Belfast jury that she had been raped twice and sexually abused by a man she allowed to walk her home.
At Belfast Crown Court Mr, Ronny Todd (25), of Ballyclare, Co Antrim, denied rape and indecent assault in July, 1994. Mr Todd's counsel, Mr Tony Cinamond QC, said the woman was fantasising and putting on a show of anguish for the benefit of the jury.
The woman, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, rejected this. She denied that she had agreed to have sex with Mr Todd.
Earlier, she told the court that she had gone to a bar in Ballyclare with a girlfriend. At, about midnight on July 1st, 1994, she had decided to go home. Her friend was not ready to leave and Mr Todd said that he would walk along the road with her to make sure she "got home all right". However, he allegedly later suggested that they take a short cut, which took them down a laneway.
"After we walked a bit along the laneway Ronny pushed me to the ground. I can remember his hands on my shoulders. He was trying to pull my skirt up", the woman claimed. She then alleged that, despite her struggles and pleas to make him stop, he raped her. "After it was over I was crying and telling him I wanted to go home. I was hysterical. He said nobody would believe me", she added.
The woman said that they then walked on for a while. "The next thing I remember was a fence and trying to get over the fence to get away from him. He pulled me down. I remember seeing something in his hand. I think it was a stick." She claimed that Mr Todd then sexually abused her with the stick before raping her for a second time.
Cross-examined by Mr Cinamond, she denied lying about her ordeal and that it was a fantasy designed as a cover-up because she had been drunk and had agreed to have sex with Mr Todd. "I want to suggest you have been play-acting about a lot of your upset and that you have been putting on a performance for the benefit of the members of the jury", said Mr Cinamond.
I'm sorry, that's not true", she replied, repeating this answer to each of the defence lawyer's claims, which included a suggestion that she had asked Mr Todd to leave her home and afterwards willingly went to a field behind a local primary school to have sex with him. But the woman did agree that she had told police that, about five or six weeks before the alleged rape, Mr Todd had attacked her at a party.
Asked why she would trust such a man to leave her home, the woman claimed that Mr Todd had apologised twice to her the following day and she had accepted this. He had behaved himself afterwards, so she decided to "give him the benefit of the doubt - a second chance". However, she maintained that she had never agreed to have sex with him and rejected defence claims that she had lied about being raped.
The trial continues today.