Donegal man cleared of rape at Central Criminal Court

This report is a localnews.ie summary based on public court reporting and records; sources are listed below.

A young man from Donegal was acquitted at the Central Criminal Court on a rape charge. The proceedings were reported on 26 February 2016.

He had pleaded not guilty. The allegation concerned an encounter in an alley in a Donegal town in July 2012.

The woman testified that he held her arms beside her body and had intercourse with her without consent. The report said she suffered heavy bleeding and attended an emergency department that night. The defence maintained that he stopped having sex immediately when she said “no, not here”.

Jurors watched a recording of his garda interview. The accused apologised for his conduct, explaining that his apology concerned drinking and trying to have sex without her consent.

According to the report, a garda questioned him aggressively and used swear words. The defence criticised the investigating garda for crude language and for talking over the accused. Giving evidence, the garda described his approach as “firm but fair”.

In her closing address, prosecuting counsel Pauline Walley SC disavowed the garda’s handling of the interview while maintaining that the evidence remained before the jury.

Under cross-examination, Shane Costelloe SC suggested that embarrassment over friends’ comments about blood on her dress had prompted the woman to invent the allegation. She rejected that suggestion. He also suggested she wanted to retract her statement because it was untrue. She explained that she had initially sought to withdraw it because the increasingly formal process frightened her and she wanted to forget what had happened.

Mr Justice Tony Hunt told jurors that either verdict would cause someone pain. He said their decision was not a judgment against anyone.