Woman grabbed my crotch at party, says rape accused

It was just the nature in the way she was talking and how she was talking [she was] quite touchy feely, I guess. Scott Kuggeleijn rape defendant

Northern Districts cricketer Scott Kuggeleijn says a woman who accuses him of rape had grabbed his crotch at a party and that’s how he knew she was interested in him.

It’s now day four of the trial in which a woman alleges the cricketer raped her at her Hamilton flat in May last year.

Kuggeleijn denies the charge.

He took the stand yesterday afternoon and says he first met the woman a few weeks before the alleged incident, before meeting her again at a friend’s party in Silverdale.

Giving evidence to the jury of four women and eight men, Kuggeleijn says he was approached by a friend of the woman early in the night and told he should “get with” the complainant.

He says he ignored the comment as he didn’t know her.

But they later started talking and “flirting” with each other.

“It was just the nature in the way she was talking and how she was talking, [she was] quite touchy feely, I guess,” he said.

He was standing in the kit- chen with his friend and the complainant when they began joking around. She then grabbed his crotch, he said.

“I thought she must be quite keen on me because it’s not something you normally do she just seemed very flirty and talked about a lot of different things that a lot of women don’t talk about.”

Soon after they decided to go into town and the pair started “kissing and hugging” in the back seat of the car they were travelling in.

They went into Furnace bar in Hamilton where they danced and kissed before leaving 17 minutes later.

When asked by his lawyer why he left so soon, he said they were getting on well and he thought they’d have sex.

Kuggeleijn said they “were pretty clearly into each other and I thought she might want to go home and things might lead to sex and by going home earlier you avoid a bigger hangover, I guess”.

The trial continues.