IN THE DOCK

initially questioned by police about an “assault”.

The police officer asked him: “You were told it was about an assault, merely an assault. So how did you go from that to rape?”

The jury of eight men and three women had heard earlier in the day that Blane Mcilroy had deleted a text he had sent to Jackson on the night in question.

Prosecutor Toby Hedworth told the court the text had read: “Is there any possibility of a threesome?”

Jackson did not reply and Mcilroy made his way to the bedroom on the first floor.

Mr Hedworth told the court: “He deleted the text in a moment of panic when police contacted him about his attendance at a police station.”

During his interviews police put it to Mcilroy that he had entered Jackson’s room and put his penis in the complainant’s mouth and it was possible she was so traumatised that she had no memory of it.

Mr Hedworth said: “He contended that it was done in a consensual way.”

Mcilroy told police at the time that the complainant appeared to be “fine”.

A recording of his interviews revealed him saying; “She didn’t seem like she was upset or hurt. Her clothes were intact and she seemed normal.”

He added he was “pretty certain” Jackson had had sex with the woman “because they were both naked in bed”.

When told by Harrison that Jackson and Olding were in police custody, Mcilroy responded: “You’re joking.”

Earlier in the day the jury heard recordings of police interviews conducted with Olding two days after the alleged sex attack.

He told police he had decided to go to bed but walked into Jackson’s bedroom to see a woman straddling him. He claimed she beckoned him to stay and performed oral sex on him.

A detective told Olding: “Her version of events is entirely different to that,” and revealed the full allegations she made against him. Olding rejected a suggestion he may have vaginally penetrated her with his penis and said he “didn’t see Paddy do that either”.

He was asked by police: “What made you believe she was consenting to oral sex?”

Olding replied: “She was doing it and I wasn’t forcing her to do it.”

He denied forcing her head to his penis or putting any pressure on her.

As the interview was brought to a close, Olding’s solicitor told police: “You can tell from his attitude that he categorically denies any involvement of any kind in these allegations.”