Alleged rape victim contradicts her own testimony

The Galway woman who alleges she was raped by a Czech national has contradicted a claim in her original garda statement that her trousers were around her knees when she ran towards a friend afterwards.

When pressed by defence counsel, Mr Diarmaid McGuinness SC, that she should remember the state of her clothes after she had been sitting on the ground before running to her friend she replied: "I still don't know if my trousers were up or down. I just seen my friend and I ran to him."

A girlfriend of the woman also admitted during her cross-examination at the Central Criminal Court by Mr McGuinness (with Mr Francis Comerford BL), that she lied to gardaí about walking to the local pub with the complainant because they had been drinking vodka beforehand.

The 24-year-old complainant agreed with Mr McGuinness that she couldn't remember shouting during the alleged attack despite telling gardaí she was screaming at the accused to stop.

She also agreed that a doctor didn't find anything abnormal when she was examined the next morning.

The developments came on day-five of the trial of the 23-year-old accused who denies raping and sexually assaulting the complainant on her parked car in a County Galway town.

Her girl friend said she and the complainant had two vodkas in the house before the complainant drove them down to the pub where the accused was drinking around 10pm on July 28, 2007.

She told Mr McGuinness she lied because the complainant was "under so much stress" from the court proceedings that she didn't want her upset further by getting her into trouble for drink-driving even though she said she wasn't "wasted" that night.

She also agreed with defence counsel that she didn't see the accused put his hands around her friend's waist under her top or kiss her at the pub.

The complainant's male friend told prosecuting counsel, Ms Mary Ellen Ring SC (with Ms Karen O'Connor BL), that she approached him from behind her car as he was on his way home from the pub where they had been drinking in and "jumped up throwing her arms around me".

He said she could "barely catch her breath" from sobbing and repeated to him: "Thank God it's you."

The man said he had bought the accused, who was known to him socially, a Smirnoff Ice earlier that night in the pub because he was heading back to the Czech Republic the next day.

He said he couldn't find the complainant in the pub at closing time and took two gulps from the drink she'd left him holding before he started heading for home.

He said he met the accused walking on the opposite side of the road a few minutes before the woman rushed towards him and thought it strange to see him there but greeted him from across the road before walking on.

The trial continues before Mr Justice Patrick McCarthy and a jury of eight men and four women.