Jury to retire this morning in indecent assault trial

Thursday 20 July 2017

The jury is expected to retire this morning to consider their verdict in the trial of a 48-year-old man who is accused of a series of indecent assaults on a girl.

Mark Loane, a well-known figure in Jersey's IT industry, denies all six charges of indecent assault against him.

Yesterday afternoon, Crown Advocate David Steenson was the first to make his final comments to the jury. He asked: "Do you think the complainant is some sort of drama queen who went through this ordeal because she wanted some sort of attention? We know people who make allegations of this nature years after the event. She simply wanted justice."

 He also noted that, during her cross-examination, the victim "made concessions" and didn't stick to one story, which he said "wasn't the sign of a liar."

Towards the end of his address, he played the recording of a confrontation between the complainant and Mr Loane, which was recorded unknown to him. After that he drew the attention of a jury to a question asked by Mr Loane. "When he wanted to get to bottom of the allegations he said, 'So when did I do that? How did it manifest itself because I genuinely don’t remember ever doing that'. Not the most compelling evidence from him.  

"Was it staged? Was it some part of some vindictive masterplan? The complainant has to be a wonderful actress to pull this off. The reason I wanted you to hear the confrontation again is because, if you can’t hear the truth of what she says, nothing I can say can convince you." 

Mr Loane's advocate, Stephen Baker, who was assisted during the trial by Advocate Julian Gollop, then addressed the 12 members of the jury. He first told them: "You need to put emotion entirely out of your mind. What you need to is analyse all the evidence you have heard coldly and calmly, that is the route to doing justice in this case."

He told them the case turned on the word of "one person", the complainant, whom he described as "... an Intelligent woman, well educated, who has a lot going for her", and asked them to decide whether they could rely on her.

Mentioning the prosecution asking why would the woman lie, he then said: "People do make things up. People convince themselves that things are true when they are not, they persuade themselves of things that are right when they are not."

He then challenged the fact the victim could remember details of what happened, but not when the alleged assaults stopped, whether she was 15 or 16 at the time, even though she didn't have to look back "decades" to do so. "Why is it she says she can remember details of what happened? Why can she remember that much and virtually nothing we say, when she is 13 or 14? What do you make of the lack of the details in those latter years."

He also noted: "In both their speeches, opening and closing, the Prosecution didn’t touch too much on the details. It is because, cnce you look at the details it starts being difficult then."  

The jury is expected to retire this morning to consider their verdict, once Royal Court Commissioner Julian Clyde-Smith has made his final directions.