Not guilty of raping sex worker

A jury has taken 30 minutes to find a Filipino dairy farmer not guilty of raping a sex worker.

The jury returned the verdict yesterday afternoon in the Palmerston North District Court in the trial of Norman Ariate Alonzo.

Alonzo, 29, had been on trial since Monday for raping a woman on September 9, 2017.

The woman and Alonzo had sex that day at Palmerston North brothel Roxannes, where she was a sex worker.

The sex began as consensual, but she said it became rape when she noticed the condom they were using was on the bed. The brothel has clear signs about mandatory condom use, and Alonzo told the court he knew the rule after going to Roxannes four times previously.

The woman said she told him to stop and physically tried to get him off her, but he kept going for at least 10 seconds. Alonzo said she never said stop, and only hit him when they both realised after finishing that the condom had come off.

In his closing address, Crown prosecutor Michael Blaschke said the jury had to find Alonzo guilty if they believed the woman.

‘‘It doesn’t matter how long it was or what happened previously. What matters is that she said stop and it carried on.

‘‘Stop means stop. It’s that simple.’’

If she was lying she could have made it so much worse for Alonzo by saying he carried on for minutes, Blaschke said. The fact she stuck to her story – the rape was short – showed she was reliable, he said.

Alonzo, however, was likely affected by alcohol, given he had been drinking earlier that night and fell asleep on the bed, Blaschke said. ‘‘A single man, stuck on a dairy farm for a month, falling asleep before he even got a massage – is that credible?’’

Defence lawyer Fergus Steedman said there was no request to stop because no-one knew the condom came off until the sex ended. The woman changed her story to explain what happened, while the condom could easily have come off without anyone knowing, he said.

‘‘She embellished on reality as a spur-of-the-moment response to the crisis she was in, and has been forced to repeat what she initially said ever since.’’

Alonzo, who needed a Filipino translator for the trial, obviously had trouble understanding English, Steedman said.

The woman said the condom was in a place on the bed that meant it had to have been removed on purpose, but Steedman said the sex was vigorous.