Woman ran naked from hotel room after being raped

An English woman has told a Central Criminal Court jury that she ran naked from her Dublin hotel room after allegedly being raped and assaulted in a bathroom by a man as her friend slept in the next room.

The woman told the jury she thought she was "going to be found dead in a hotel bathroom in Dublin", before her friend woke up and they managed to escape from the man they had met earlier that evening in a pub.

The 54-year-old English man, who can not be named for legal reasons, has pleaded not guilty to rape, oral rape and sexual assault of the woman on March 20, 2007. He has also pleaded not guilty to threatening to kill the woman and threatening her that he would kill her friend.

He has pleaded guilty to assaulting the woman causing her harm on the same occasion.

The woman told Ms Pauline Walley SC (with Ms Mary Rose Gearty BL), prosecuting, that she had arrived in Dublin on Sunday March 18, 2007 with a friend for a short holiday. She said the following day they did the "usual tourist things" and then spent the later part of the day, which was very cold, in two Temple Bar pubs.

She said she met the accused man in the smoking area of one of the pubs and began chatting. She said the man told her he was originally from England but had come back to Ireland seven years previously to bury his Irish "mammy". She said he later joined herself and her friend at their table in the pub and they found him "pleasant".

Witness said the man asked to walk them back to their hotel and the friends agreed he could come into their room on the fifth floor of the hotel for a drink so he could give them advice on where to visit the following day.

The woman said he lay on the bed for a time watching television and chatting to her friend. She said her friend came to her and said he had asked if he could sleep in a chair in the room. The woman said, even though her friend did not have a problem with him staying, she did not agreed because he had told them he lived nearby.

She said her friend came back to her and told her the man rather liked her (witness) and wanted to give her a cuddle. She said she let this "go over her head" and had a chat with the man at the door expecting him to leave.

The woman said her friend was now asleep on her bed. She said the accused asked for a "goodnight kiss" and "shoved" her into the bathroom. She said he shut the door and as she struggled he banged her head off the wall and when she was facing him punched her once in the face.

She said the man kept repeating "I am in control now, you would not let me stay" during the alleged attack. She said he told her several times that he would kill her and her friend.

The woman said he told her to take off her clothes and she complied so he would not hurt her. She said he told her to lean on the sink and he raped her from behind after hitting her "lots of times" on her bottom.

She said he then pushed her to her knees and put his penis in her mouth telling her: "If you don't do it right I will kill you." She said she later managed to get out of the bathroom and dived across her bed to pull her sleeping friends hair. She said she told her "he is going to kill us" before the accused pulled her back into the bathroom.

She said her friend had opened her eyes but then closed them and put her head back on the pillow.

The woman told Ms Walley that the accused kept his hand over her mouth in the bathroom and she could not breathe. She said she believed that she was going to die or that she was already dead.

She said the accused told her he was going to kill her, then do the same things to her friend before killing her.

She said a few seconds later she heard her friend shout "get out now" which startled the accused and she ran naked out of the room following her friend down the corridor. She said the next thing she remembered was someone putting a blanket around her and being treated in hospital for injuries to her face, ribs, arms and knees.

She said following the attack she was in shock and "words could not describe" how she felt.

Earlier, in opening the case, Ms Walley told the jury they would hear evidence that the gardaí had been alerted by the hotel manager after the women ran to the hotel lobby and the accused had been found by gardai hiding in a linen cupboard on the third floor.

The trial continues before Mr Justice George Birmingham and a jury of five men and seven women.