Witness lied, says girl

Press, Volume CXVI, Issue 34105, 18 March 1976, Page 2

Witness lied, says girl

F <N Z Press Association; WANGANUI, March 17. The third day’s hearing of a gang-rape charge against 10 Taumarunui Mongrel Mob members was adjourned at midday in the Supreme Court at Wanganui today, and the jury was excluded from the hearing of legal argument.

Nine members of the Mongrel Mob are charged with rape, and a tenth with attempted rape. One is also charged with indecent assault and another with stealing the complainant’s driving licence.

The trial is before Mr Justice Beattie and an all-male

jury. Mr F. F. Latham, with him Mr S. J. Taylor, is prosecuting and the accused ate represented bv Mr P. A Williams. Mr M. H. W Lance, and Mr J. W. T»zard.

The trial will resume tomorrow.

This morning the 18-year-old complainant was recalled to the witness stand for the third time, because of a change in the evidence given by a prosecution witness yesterday. She had already spent a total of 81 hours giving evidence on Monday and yesterd«v. The complainant said that

when she was outside with Mr Charles Pahi he asked her to have sex with him. She refused. “He said it would either be him or he would call all of them to rape me,’’ the witness said. "That’s what I understood. 1 was just crying, and told him to leave me alone. I don’t know whether he would have really done it or if he was just trying to frighten me.’’ She could not remember what she did. "I think I went into the party then.” Cross-examined by Mr Williams, the complainant said she volunteered to give additional evidence today after reading in the newspaper of the change in Mr Pahi’s evidence.

“It was a lie,” she said. Mr Pahi had not actually said he would call the others to rape her, but that was her understanding. She denied having intercourse with Mr Pahi.

She agreed with Mr Williams that it would be “low behaviour” for a man to obtain sex by threats, and that if such a thing were true he would be despicable. "But he did help me get away. Anything might have happened if he hadn’t.” She agreed that the man who, she had said yesterday, was helpful and kind had been threatening and blackmailing her, although she did not know if the threats were meant seriously. The complainant told Mr Lance that for most of the

hour and a half she spent* in the vegetable patch with Mr Pahi he had acted as her protector and did nothing to alarm her. His suggestion of sex had come "out of the blue,” with no preliminaries. He tried to undo her top button, and she

cried and told him to leave her alone. “As far as I remember that was all he tried to do," witness said. When Mr Pahl tried to have intercourse with her she was “half-sitting halflying." If he had succeeded in having intercourse it would have been rape. She went downtown with him because he helped her and she trusted him. The complainant told Mr Lance that she had accepted Mr Pahi as her protector. She could not remember if it had been hard to forget his attempt to have Intercourse with her. She had run Inside because She was afraid of Mr Pahi. She had told Detective Sergeaht John Carr, of Palmerston North, of Mt Pahi’s actions after thfe depositions hearing, although she had not mentioned it in evidence. Sergeant Carr had said that he would tell someone. “He told me not to forget it, but I did." She said she considered the matter to be a “little thing.” She had not remembered the matter again until last night. Detective Sergeant David McEwen, of Wanganui, said eight accused were among 17 men in an identification parade at the Wanganui police station on January 5. The complainant identified two of the accused as being involved in the incident, Mr Pahi identified five men, and Mr John Knights identified four of the accused.