Jury told to acquit man charged with rape on Derulo tour bus

A judge has directed a jury to acquit a second man accused of raping a woman on a tour bus after a Jason Derulo concert.

On day 12 of the trial on Monday, Mr Justice Paul Butler told the jury at the Central Criminal Court that although he was very reluctant to withdraw the case from them, it was necessary as a matter of law.

He told them that while the investigation was handled very well overall, the failure to test the neck of the accused man for DNA left a very real danger of an unfair trial.

The jury heard that the 35-year-old, who denied raping the then 19-year-old woman in June 2014, told gardaí the complainant had kissed him on the right side of his neck. He said he believed her saliva would be there, and asked them to test for it.

During her evidence in the trial, the woman repeatedly denied that she had kissed the man.

The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, had pleaded not guilty to rape, oral rape, sexual assault and false imprisonment of the the woman. The offences allegedly occurred in a vehicle at an unknown location in Cork city on June 27th, 2014.

The direction to the jury to acquit the man on all charges ends the trial.

Last Wednesday Timothy O’Leary SC, prosecuting, told the jury that the Director of Public Prosecutions was dropping all charges against a 44-year-old co-accused because of insufficient evidence.

Separate ruling

This followed a separate ruling by Mr Justice Butler which prevented the prosecution from calling certain evidence in relation to this defendant. Mr Justice Butler told the jury on Monday that last week he ruled that the man’s detention was unlawful.

Mr Derulo was not charged with any offence in relation to these events.

The complainant in this case alleged that a man, identified as “cap guy”, blocked her from getting off the tour bus. She claims he brought her upstairs, where he raped her, orally and vaginally, while they were “half in, half out of a bunk bed.”

She claims another larger man came over at one point and also raped her. The woman said she was terrified and asked them to stop, but they did not. She said she managed to make her escape after a third man came over and said “I’m next”.

It was the prosecution case that “cap guy” was the 35-year-old accused and the larger man was the 44-year-old accused. Both men denied all the charges.

Lawyers for the 35-year-old accused told the jury that their client accepted he had sex with the complainant, and accepted she performed oral sex on him, but did not accept consent was absent.