A Tipperary woman has told a jury in the Central Criminal Court that she resigned herself to being murdered during an alleged rape by a man after a disco. The woman, in her 30s, was giving evidence in the trial of a 27year-old man who denies raping and sexually assaulting her in a south Tipperary town on May 6th, 1996.
The woman told Mr Paul O'Higgins SC, prosecuting, she had agreed to go for a walk with the man after the disco. They walked for a short distance before sitting on a bench. Suddenly the man said: "you are all the fucking same" and she found herself pushed on to her back on the ground and he held her wrists. "At this point I had resigned myself to the fact I was going to die. I knew what was going to happen but I thought I was going to die."
She claimed the man did not say anything while he raped her. Afterwards he got up, said "sorry", and walked away.
Under cross-examination by Mr Michael Counihan SC, the witness denied she had "courted" with the defendant and consented to sex.
She said there had been no bodily contact between them and she took it he was a nice, genuine person and the type of person she liked to talk to.
Pressed on the accused's claim she consented to sex, she answered: "He decided he was going to have sex - she did not want to have sex but she was going to get it whether she liked it or not."
A Garda sergeant said the woman made a complaint of rape on March 5th, 1997. The defendant was arrested 11 days later. The trial before Mr Justice Smith and the jury continues.