Defendant claims boys ‘poisoned’

Press, 23 January 1988, Page 9

Defendant claims boys ‘poisoned’

A man, aged 35, on trial in the Christchurch District Court on 20 charges of indecent assault, said the boys who gave evidence had been “poisoned." Dougal John Crossan was giving evidence on his own behalf during the third day of the trial yesterday. The trial is expected to end on Monday, when Judge Erber will sum up. The Crown is represented by Mr D. J. L. Saunders. The charges cover 12 years until last year. Crossan, represented by Mr S. C. Barker, had said earlier he would give the boys a kiss and a hug some nights. He said some allegations by another of the boys were “trumped up,” because the boy was “hacked off” with his brother’s success in a uniform award. The boys were all in a youth group of which Crossan was one of the leaders. Crossan said he was "deeply distressed about one of the boy’s statements.” “He has been poisoned. His statements refer to incidents which just did not happen.” The incidents involve boys then aged from 9 to 16. The allegations include putting hands down one of the boy’s pants while on a visit to Arthurs Pass, that he committed an inde-' cency while in the shower with two of the boys and that he rubbed a boy’s penis. A further alleged incident occurred while the boys were taken for a swim at QEII pool. Crossan told the court his “penis had been up in the air,” when he cuddled one of the boys at the pool, because the water had been cold. “I would have put my arm around his shoulder. There was no indecency,”

he said, in response to questioning from Mr Barker, on a boys evidence. In another allegation, Mr Barker said a boy had said Crossan rubbed his hands up and down his pants. Crossan said, “It did not happen.” Concerning the incident in the shower, Crossan said he accepted he had washed the boy, but that did not include his penis. Under cross-examina-tion, Crossan told the court he became involved with the youth group at age 17. Mr Saunders said that Crossan’s defence was that five children and three adults “had all told lies about what had occurred.” Crossan said, “I would rather use the term, misappropriation of the truth.” Crossan said he had become like a father to some of the boys. A character witness then told the court she had known Crossan 2i/ 2 years and had herself been an officer in the group. The woman said she had never seen Crossan commit an indecent act of any sort. Mr Saunders said children did not fantasise such incidents unless they really happened. He said it was difficult to escape the truth that there was sexual misconduct. “Clearly there are some inconsistencies (in the boys’ evidence), but that, in fact, shows some truthfulness in the boys’ evidence,” he said. He said he failed to see how they could get together to form such a set of false accusations. Mr Barker said that to suggest there was no collaboration was “farcical.” He said Crossan had no previous convictions and there was nothing to substantiate what the boys had said.