Rapist denied appeal request
Justices: Ground not established
A “manipulative and narcissistic” man found guilty of rape just over three years ago has lost his appeal for an extension of time to appeal.
Zachary William Trott, now 28, harassed and intimidated women across North Queensland – he set up fake social media profiles, called from blocked numbers, threatened to kill himself and them, reported false crimes to police and arrived at their homes uninvited.
In 2021, a Townsville District Court jury found Trott guilty of rape, while he pleaded guilty to stalking three women and taking pictures of a naked woman, who he raped, while she was asleep.
At the time, crown Prosecutor Aaron Dunkerton said Trott’s behaviour toward three young victims was “manipulative” and “narcissistic”.
He stalked a woman he met on Facebook.
“He sought to manipulate
(her) into speaking with him by claiming he was dying,” Mr Dunkerton said.
Townsville man Zachary William Trott was found guilty of rape after trial. He also pleaded guilty to stalking and a string of other offences.
“He threatened to visit the homes of her friends and commit suicide. He also, quite
concerningly threatened violence toward (her) partner,” Mr Dunkerton said.
Trott lied to police and “remarkably” claimed the woman had been stalking him, Mr Dunkerton.
He was charged and released on bail, but despite this went on to “immediately” stalk another woman, he said.
When this second woman blocked him, he went to her home and lied to police when they intervened claiming she held him hostage.
Trott then began to prey on a third woman, calling and texting her hundreds of times, turning up to her home and work over a month in 2019.
At one stage, he told a friend of the woman that he wanted to stab and kill her.
After a night out on Flinders St where the woman rebuffed his advances multiple times, Trott got in her car uninvited and requested she drive him home.
Mr Dunkerton said when they arrived she went inside for a glass of water after effects of alcohol washed over her.
She woke the next morning to him grabbing her hand and forcing on to his genitals before he digitally raped her.
“When she said stop – he didn’t,” Mr Dunkerton.
While the woman was asleep Trott took her clothes off and took pictures of her.
Mr Dunkerton said Trott showed a lack of insight, a denial of his conduct and portrayed himself as the victim.
Trott has previous convictions for stalking, breaching a restraining order and using a carriage service to harass.
He was given a head sentence of five years with 656 days already served.
In the Court of Appeal heard this month in Brisbane, Justices Flanagan, Boddice and Mitchell rejected his application for extension of time within which to appeal the conviction.
They said that the trial judge emphasised that the jury had to decide whether, having regard to the whole of the evidence, the prosecution had proved the rape offence.
“The jury were told that the use that the Crown sought to make of the evidence was the only way in which the evidence could be used,’’ they said.
“In the circumstances of this case, this direction sufficiently guarded against the risk that the jury might use the evidence for some impermissible purpose,” Justices Flanagan, Boddice and Mitchell said.
“The fact that trial counsel, immersed in the atmosphere of the trial, did not complain of the direction that was given tends to reinforce that conclusion.”
The appeal finding said that the trial judge’s direction did not give rise to any miscarriage of justice in the particular circumstances of this case.
“The sole ground of appeal is not established,’’ they said.
“It is unnecessary to consider the respondent’s submission as to the application of the ‘proviso’ in the event miscarriage was established.
“Given the length of the delay in instituting the appeal, the lack of any adequate explanation for that delay and the lack of merit in the appeal, the application for an extension of time in which to appeal should be dismissed.’’