Dunedin man acquitted of Signal Hill rape allegation

Jurors have unanimously acquitted a man accused of rape. Photo / ODT

A Dunedin man has been acquitted over allegations he raped a woman after taking her to a lookout following a night out.

A jury unanimously found the 20-year-old defendant not guilty of the violation at the conclusion of a week-long trial at the Dunedin District Court.

The court heard the pair had met in central Dunedin in December 2022 after previously communicating through social-media app Snapchat.

CCTV footage of them walking through the Octagon without incident was played during the trial.

The defendant said he intended to drop the woman off at home but she insisted they drive to the Signal Hill lookout.

Once there, the man said the intimacy was consensual, and the complainant had been the one who suggested it.

Jurors had to contend with contrasting accounts.

The woman told the court she recalled being denied entry to a bar, then her next memory was of waking up in the back of the defendant’s car.

She called police almost immediately after the incident to make the rape complaint and officers found her minutes later alone on Signal Hill Rd.

Under cross-examination, though, she was uncertain about how much she drank that night, whether the defendant had suggested sex and whether she moved to the back seat of the vehicle without assistance.

But the complainant remained unequivocal about whether she consented to the sexual contact.

“No. I was asleep, passed out,” she said.

Police found the defendant in town after they had spoken to the woman.

He said while she had been “wobbly”, she appeared to be communicating relatively normally.

“I know she was awake — she talked to me,” he said.

After the jury’s verdict the defendant was allowed to leave the dock.