Jason Lee trial: Saliva found on shorts of US rape accused

Saliva was found on the shorts of an American banker accused of raping an Irish J-1 student but his underwear showed no traces of semen, according to the evidence of a forensic scientist on the fifth day of his trial.

Jason Lee (38) faces 25 years in prison if found guilty of the attack at a $33,000-a-month holiday home in the Hamptons outside New York.

On Tuesday the court heard from Moly Phillip, of the Suffolk County Crime Laboratory, who examined Mr Lee's clothing, including a pair of white boxer briefs.

“The result was negative for the presence of semen,” she said.

She also said that swabs taken from the victim, who was aged 20 at the time of the alleged attack and gave evidence on Tuesday, also proved negative.

Defence lawyers do not deny that Mr Lee and the woman had sex, but maintain the encounter was consensual.

Keriann Kelly, for the prosecution, tried repeatedly to ask Ms Phillip about the circumstances under which she would expect to find semen on underclothes.

Andrew Lanker, a lawyer for Mr Lee, objected to the line of questioning and Justice Barbara Kahn, who is sitting at Suffolk County Court in Riverhead, Long Island, agreed.

“The witness, I believe, is not qualified to answer this question,” she said.

Earlier Ms Phillip said she had also found evidence of saliva on the “inside front part of the (shorts) and the crotch area”.

The stains, she added, had been sent for DNA analysis.

The court heard from the alleged victim a day earlier. She had flown to the US to give evidence along with her best friend who was with her on the day of the attack in August 2013.

The woman, who has not been identified in court, described how Mr Lee forced open the door to the bathroom where she was getting changed after a late night swim in her underwear at his holiday home.

She was knocked to the floor by the door. Then Mr Lee pinned her down and raped her, she said.

“With every ounce of strength I had I pulled up my knee,” she said, forcing it into his groin, and ending the attack.

She described how the evening had started as a fun night out in the town of Montauk, where her brother had been working for the summer.

She had spent the evening drinking vodka with his friends, before meeting Mr Lee, who worked at Goldman Sachs, and his friend at a club.

“We thought it was funny that there were two men over talking to us,” she said. “We were only students and the nightclub we were in was expensive and we were out of place.”

She also told the court that her parents did not know what happened to her.

“No, nobody at home knows what happened,” she said,

Mr Lee (38) who is married, denies first-degree rape, sexual misconduct and third-degree assault. He waived the right to a jury trial and the case is being heard by Justice Kahn sitting alone.

The strategy is used by defence lawyers who believe their client cannot get a fair hearing from a jury.

Tensions sometimes run high in the Hamptons between residents working in seasonal tourism jobs and big-spending visitors from New York.

The trial continues.