Jury retires to consider child sex assault accusation

Thursday 31 October 2019

A jury of seven women and five men has retired to consider whether a construction worker in his 50s groped a young girl following a three-day trial in the Royal Court.

After testimony from the alleged victim, the defendant himself, a DNA expert and other witnesses for both the prosecution and defence, the trial of Manuel Antonio Marques Duarte (55) is now heading towards its conclusion.

Mr Duarte stands accused of sexually assaulting a young girl by slipping his hands into her leggings and underwear to grope her bottom and touch her genitalia - an allegation he denies.

Today, in a final bid to make their case to the jury, both counsel made their closing speeches after Royal Court Commissioner Sir John Saunders advised the jurors on matters of law.

Pictured: The jury has heard three days of evidence.

Summing up the prosecution’s case, the Solicitor General compared the alleged victim’s account, which he described as “strikingly consistent”, with the evidence of Mr Duarte, which he slammed as being “inconsistent and evasive".

Mr Duarte’s accuser, the prosecutor said, remained consistent from when she first complained about the alleged incident, through her recorded Police interview, to being cross-examined by Advocate Michael Haines. 

Addressing the members of the jury, the Solicitor General said that the alleged victim and the other child who gave evidence for the prosecution “do not exaggerate” about the defendant’s actions and that they were “also clear about what he did not do”.

Although both children were given “opportunities to make the allegations against the defendant more serious”, they did not take those opportunities, the prosecution reasoned.

He took the jury back through the claims of the alleged victim in this case, reminding the jurors that she was very clear Mr Duarte had touched her “inside” her clothing and “under” her underwear. 

In contrast, the Solicitor General focussed on where the defendant’s testimony was less clear. He pointed to where the defendant’s answers to his lawyer’s and the prosecutor’s questions had changed over the course of his time on the stand. 

Pictured: Solicitor General Mark Temple led the prosecution case.

The prosecutor dwelled on how Mr Duarte had said he’d grabbed the girl’s wrist “by chance”, asking the jury: “How can you grab somebody’s wrist 'by chance'?" 

He recalled how Mr Duarte had first said on the stand that he was whispering to his alleged victim around the time of the alleged assault, and then he claimed he was “talking low” and that he wasn’t whispering in her ear as she’d described. 

The Solicitor General also raised concerns about the testimony of the DNA ‘expert’ called to testify for the defence and other inconsistencies amongst other defence witnesses before urging jurors to “put yourself in [the alleged victim’s] position".

Mr Duarte’s lawyer, Advocate Haines, reminded jurors at the outset of his speech that his client “emphatically denies committing this assault” and that he “has lived with the stress and uncertainty of that allegation” since it was made.

Of his client’s testimony when he took the stand to give evidence on his own behalf, Advocate Haines explained to the jury that “he is not an articulate person”, that he “may not have had the advantage of a good education”, but “that does not make him a bad person” or, indeed, guilty.

Pictured: Mr Duarte took the stand to give evidence on his own behalf.

The defence lawyer remarked that if the members of the jury were to view his evidence in that regard, “that would be a sad day indeed".

He raised several questions as to whether, on witness accounts of the evening in question, there was sufficient opportunity for Mr Duarte to carry out the alleged assault as described.

In the way that the evening unfolded, Advocate Haines claimed that carrying out the alleged assault as described by Mr Duarte’s accuser would “involve enormous risk on [his] part".

In contrast to the Solicitor General, the defence lawyer claimed that the DNA expert offered a “careful and considered opinion” and her findings provided “a significant piece of evidence in this case".

Elsewhere in his closing address, Advocate Haines drew out what he described as “significant inconsistencies” between the alleged victim’s evidence and the other child witness.

Bringing his speech to a close before urging the jury to find the defendant 'not guilty', the Advocate emphasised: “This is one person’s word against another person’s word. Who is telling the truth?... To repeat wrong evidence to others does not change the evidence; it remains wrong evidence.” 

The Commissioner then summarised all the evidence that has been heard in the court over the last three days and the jury was invited to retire to consider their verdict.

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