Lawyer on trial for sex abuse ‘apologised in letter to father’
A SCOTS advocate sent a letter of apology to the father of girls he is accused of sexually abusing, a trial heard yesterday.
In it, John Watt, 72, appeared to ‘apologise unreservedly’ for his conduct and referred to his ‘estrangement’ from the family.
The letter was found in her father’s papers by one of the two women allegedly attacked by Watt at a property in Edinburgh city centre between October 1978 and June 1983.
Now 52, she told a jury at the High Court in Glasgow that she was touched inappropriately by Watt after waking to see him in her sister’s bed.
Her sister, who is two years younger, had earlier told the court that she was groped in bed during a party attended by other lawyers.
Watt is on trial accused of indecently assaulting the 52-year-old woman when she was a child. He is also accused of using lewd, indecent and libidinous practices towards her younger sister and towards a man when he was a child.
He denies a total of five charges including the rape of a girl aged between seven and 11 between September 1973 and August 1978.
He has lodged a special defence of incrimination for the rape charge and pointed blame at deceased lawyer Richard Watt.
The 52-year-old woman told the court that she woke to find Watt in her sister’s bed for ten minutes. The woman claimed she was ‘frightened’ and turned away before herself being joined by Watt in bed.
Prosecutor Kath Harper asked what happened. She replied: ‘He had his hand under the bed clothes.’
The woman sobbed as she described being touched inappropriately by Watt for ‘ten minutes or what felt like ten minutes’.
The woman said she did not tell anyone what had happened to her, adding: ‘If I told someone I would have to talk about it again – I just couldn’t say it.
‘If I didn’t say it then I would just pretend it hadn’t happened.’
The woman told how she found a letter of her father’s from someone called ‘John’ when sorting his documents in 2016.
The prosecutor asked who the witness believed the letter to be from and she replied: ‘John Watt.’
The letter read: ‘Thank you for your letter, I appreciate it is equally difficult for me to reply. I will not plead drink in aid... for any offence and distrust I caused. I apologise unreservedly.
‘I appreciate and understand your sentiments and shall respect them. The greatest tragedy will be our estrangement.’
The witness said: ‘I understand it to be an admission of his guilt in terms of what happened to my sister.’
Donald Findlay, QC, defending, put it to the woman that her sister told the court that she was alone in the bedroom when she was abused.
She replied: ‘If that’s what she said, then that is not what I remember.’
The trial continues today before Lord Braid.
‘Pretend it hadn’t happened’