Kurtley Beale trial: woman aired sexual assault allegations on family trip to buy wedding dress, court hears
A woman who claims she was sexually assaulted by the rugby star Kurtley Beale held concerns about telling police due to the former Wallaby’s public profile, a court has heard.
Beale, 35, is facing one count of sexual intercourse without consent and two counts of sexual touching in the NSW district court, following the alleged incident at Bondi’s Beach Road hotel in December 2022.
The woman alleges Beale touched her backside and forced her to perform oral sex in the toilet cubicle. The former Wallabies playmaker has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
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The woman’s father told a hearing on Monday he saw “fear on her face” before she told him of the allegations.
“I’m scared that because of his profile people will hate us,” the father told the court he remembered his daughter saying.
The woman expressed similar concerns over Beale’s profile to her sister, as well as a fear she would not be believed.
The court heard that the sister recalled the woman saying: “People don’t generally believe what girls say or judge in their favour - especially when alcohol is involved.”
During a second week of hearings, the trial has heard from a number of family members and friends who described the woman as being highly distressed and crying a lot in the period after the alleged assault.
The court also heard from the woman’s future mother-in-law, who she visited in Queensland to shop for wedding dresses the morning after the alleged assault.
The mother-in-law said the woman was crying and shaking as she revealed she had been sexually assaulted by Beale the night before.
While being driven to report the incident to police, the alleged victim said Beale forcibly put his penis in her mouth, the court heard.
“Why didn’t you bite the fucking thing?” the mother-in-law told the court had she replied.
The court heard the woman told the mother-in-law that Beale was highly intoxicated during and in the lead-up to the alleged assault.
“He was extremely pissed,” the woman reportedly said. “He could hardly stand up and he was pinching me on the arse all night.”
The woman said she didn’t tell her fiance – who was in a different section of the pub at the time and also “very drunk” – for fears he would “end up in the police station”, the court heard.
A staff member at the Beach Road Hotel who was using the bathroom at the time of the alleged assault told the court on Monday he saw what he believed were a man and woman’s feet in the same cubicle.
The man said he was in the bathroom for roughly two minutes, during which he didn’t hear any sounds of a struggle or dispute from within the cubicle.
“I didn’t hear any noises the whole time,” the man said.
“Did you hear anyone say ‘no’?” Beale’s lawyer Margaret Cunneen SC asked him.
“I didn’t,” he replied.
Last week, the court heard four gruelling days of testimony from the woman, who was cross-examined at length by Cunneen.
Cunneen suggested the woman had concocted the rape allegation to gain sympathy from her fiance and save her impending marriage when the couple’s relationship was strained.
“You have made this up for your own purposes to save the proposed marriage that you had been anticipating so excitedly,” she said.
Cunneen further suggested the woman invited Beale to the bathroom and willingly engaged in oral sex with him.
But the complainant denied her contact with Beale was consensual and denied that she had been flirtatious with him before the alleged assault.
The trial will continue until at least the end of the week.
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