Disability worker’s sex claim

Rape trial told actions consensual

A DISABILITY support worker standing trial on a charge of rape has denied he saw his client as an “easy target” when he engaged in what he told police was consensual oral sex.

Thomas Joseph Gardam has pleaded not guilty to rape and is standing trial in the Supreme Court in Burnie.

The charge stems from September 3, 2018, when he was in the alleged victim’s unit helping him prepare dinner.

In evidence, his client claimed his carer later forced him into the bedroom and gave him oral sex by force.

The client also told the jury his carer then told him to stay quiet about what had happened.

Gardam told police in an interview the day after the alleged crime his client had been asking him questions about sexuality saying he wanted to figure his feelings out.

In the interview, which was played to the jury, Gardam claimed his client had asked for oral sex and that he had reluctantly complied.

Gardam agreed with an assertion made by police in that interview that he had crossed the line in his role as carer.

“If any of your other clients asked for oral sex would you do it? Gardam was asked.

“No,” he said. “He was asking me questions about sexuality.

“It was both our ideas and he said he was 100 per cent comfortable with it.”

The support worker, who has since left the care sector, also told police he was worried his client would become violent if he refused his request for sex – despite him not showing any inclination towards violence in their other dealings.

“I knew I shouldn’t be doing it,’’ Gardam told police.

“But he had shown me a knife he kept in a cupboard earlier and kept looking at the cupboard when I said we had to stop.”

The mother of the client’s then girlfriend gave evidence that the alleged victim was shaking and visibly upset when he had arrived at her house after the alleged rape.

“You could see he had been crying and he looked shaky. He told me he had been sexually assaulted,” she told the court.

The woman gave evidence she took the man to the police station where he reported the alleged rape.

The trial continues.