Roache ‘not interested in gratuitous sex or minors’
Roache, 81, told a jury he cheated on his wife with “a series of relationships” in the mid-to-late 1960s at a time when he is alleged to have committed two rapes and four indecent assaults.
The offences involving the five complainants aged 16 and under were said to have taken place between 1965 and 1971.
Prosecutor Anne Whyte put it to Roache, that he became a “heart throb” and at the time had fame, celebrity, and good looks. He denied a suggestion that this caused him to believe he was “beyond sexual scrutiny”.
“No, I’m sorry I was always very caring, always honest, even in the relationships I went into,” he said.
“I was not interested in gratuitous sex and certainly not with underage people.”
He said his marriage to actress Anna Cropper was in trouble from 1965 until 1969 when they divorced. He was unfaithful “intermittently” as they led “virtually separate lives”.
Roache said he began a relationship with his second wife Sara Mottram in 1970 or 1971 and they were married in 1978. He said he was “totally faithful” to her for 39 years until her death.
Ms Whyte asked Roache if he would say he was attractive to members of the opposite sex in the 60s. “That is for others to say,” he said. “But I did have fan mail which suggested that.”
The rape complainant said Roache had sex without her consent on two occasions when she was 15 in 1967 — at his Lancashire bungalow and at an adjoining cottage. He denied the suggestion he effectively led the rape complainant to a bedroom with “no words or intimacy or foreplay”. “You put her on a bed and had sex with her,” said Ms Whyte. “No,” Roache replied. “Definitely and categorically not.”
Ms Whyte said: “I am going to suggest that you took what you needed and wanted without any consent at all.” He replied: “That is not in my nature at all...I would never have forced myself on anybody and nor would I need to.”
Turning to a woman who claimed she was indecently assaulted aged 14 in the gents toilets at Granada in 1965, Ms Whyte said: “As I understand your evidence, there is absolutely no way” he would find himself in a lavatory with a teenager assisting him in a sex act?
“Absolutely not,” he said.
He said it would have been “very unusual” for unauthorised members of the public to roam the corridors without security or a chaperone.
Ms Whyte said: “I am going to suggest to you that [the alleged victim] was in the dressing room and you manoeuvred a situation quite hurriedly. You took her by the arm and took her into the gents toilets.”
Roache said: “I absolutely and categorically have to deny it. I have no interest at all in sexual immaturity.”
Roache was questioned about a letter and signed photo he sent to her.
Ms Whyte asked why a married man in his 30s was encouraging a schoolgirl to write to him. Roache said it was just an example of “friendly” fan mail.
Another alleged victim claimed Roache sexually assaulted her in his dressing room after he had got her a pass into the studio.
The prosecutor put it to Roache that he knew that if he made a young person feel special enough, she would accept anything he did without complaint. Roache said: “I don’t think like that at all. I have never thought I was special.”
Questioned about the fifth complainant, Ms Whyte reminded the jury that the alleged indecent assault was witnessed and corroborated by the complainant’s friend who was passenger in the back of his Rolls Royce.
“But of course, if you are telling us the truth, she’s either very mistaken or dishonest?” Miss Whyte said. He said: “Absolutely yes.”
The trial continues.
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