Our ‘little secret’: Teen cried and hugged her puppy during rape ordeal

WARNING: This article deals with the subject of rape and may be distressing for some readers.

A 61-year-old man raped a teenage girl as she lay on a bed crying and hugging her puppy — it was the second time Brian John Moran had raped the 16 year old.

The first time he did so after buying her clothes and a meal and getting her drunk, telling her afterwards what had happened was their “little secret”.

Moran is serving 10 years in prison after being found guilty by a Tauranga District Court jury of two charges of rape — offences dating back to 2011 and 2012.

He has this month failed in a bid to have his convictions overturned by the Court of Appeal.

The court’s decision says Moran had first met his victim when she was a little girl. She was a relative of a friend of his.

When visiting his friend’s house in 2011, he told the girl he had just won $100,000 and offered to take her shopping. She agreed.

He bought her clothes and took her to dinner at a restaurant, where he ordered alcoholic drinks for her. He then took her to his house, stopping on the way to buy beer, which he gave her until she became very drunk.

He raped her in his bedroom, telling her afterwards that what happened was a secret and she owed him for the things he had bought her.

The second rape happened a few weeks later, after Moran took her to his bach, buying her a mobile phone on the way.

The girl also took her puppy with her.

The girl went to a pub with some people who lived next door to the bach. Moran came into the pub, very angry because the puppy had damaged his couch.

He took the girl back to the bach and told her to go to the bedroom, saying that what had happened before was going to happen again.

The complainant lay on her side on the bed, crying and holding her puppy, while Moran raped her.

Although Moran was found guilty on the rape charges, the jury found him not guilty of attempting to receive paid sexual services from the same young woman in early 2013, when she was aged 17.

The appeal court decision said that in later years, when she was 19 or 20, the young woman sometimes agreed to sleep with Moran in return for payment.

In the following years, however, when Moran tried to maintain contact with her or find out where she was living, she warned him that she would tell police about the rapes if he kept trying to contact her.

Finally, in 2019, Moran sent the woman a text message accusing her of stealing money from another person. She then went to the police and laid a complaint.

One of the grounds on which Moran appealed his rape convictions was the trial judge was wrong to permit evidence of subsequent sexual contact between him and the young woman.

The Appeal Court judges said that the evidence of sexual contact for money was “relevant to the defence narrative” and admissible at trial.

Moran also said the judge summarised the counsel cases in an “unfair and unbalanced way”.

The Court of Appeal said it was “satisfied that the judge’s summary of the defence case was fair, and material parts of that case were communicated to the jury”.

Moran also said the judge failed to give the jury warnings under sections of the Evidence Act dealing with lies and unreliable evidence.

The appeal judges said the trial judge did not err in failing to give directions under these sections.

Moran’s appeal against his convictions was dismissed.

He did not appeal against his 10-year prison sentence.