Rapist’s conviction stands

Appeal judges rule ‘a fair trial has not been jeopardised’ and jail sentence till stay

A man found guilty of rape at a jury trial in November, 2021, has appealed against his conviction.

The man was convicted in Cairns District Court of four counts of rape of a woman related to him by marriage, one count of indecent assault with a circumstance of aggravation and one count of indecent assault.

He had raped her digitally, orally and vaginally after asking her to clean for him after hours at his shop and nearby house.

The court sentenced the man to nine years’ imprisonment in total for the charges.

No parole eligibility date was fixed, and as a result, he will become eligible for parole after he has served half of his period of imprisonment.

The man recently appealed his conviction on four grounds, of which the appeal judges recognised the first as the main one.

The first ground for appeal was that the Crown prosecutor had brought about a miscarriage of justice by suggesting to the jury during his closing address that the defendant had engaged in “recent invention” without having put this contention to the appellant in cross-examination.

In other words, the Crown prosecutor told the jury he had made things up, but had not given the defendant the opportunity to answer that claim.

A rule quoted in the appeal documents states that if a court is to be invited to disbelieve a witness, the grounds upon which the evidence is to be disbelieved should be put to the witness in cross-examination so that the witness may have an opportunity to offer an explanation.

The appeal judges found the case did not involve any breach of that rule.

In their examination of the appeal, they wrote that the “prosecutor did not, in crossexamination, nor in his address, make any suggestion of recent invention”.

They wrote that he had not asked the jury to come to any conclusions about the defendant’s credibility.

“In those circumstances,” they wrote, “a fair trial has not been jeopardised”.

They did not consider the remaining appeal grounds and dismissed the appeal.