Defence counsel for a celebrity who is on trial for engaging in sexual acts with a 16-year -old girl when he was 27 has told a jury that "fantasy was laid over reality" by the complainant.
Morgan Shelley BL was completing his closing arguments in the trial of the man who denies three charges of defilement of a child alleged to have taken place in 2010.
Mr Shelley told the jury that the prosecution had to prove not just that the sexual acts occurred but that they took place in 2010 when the girl was 16 and they "can't do that".
He said the entire case was based on "memories of text messages" while the messages themselves were not available.
"If the entire narrative is based on a memory of a text message how do you find the prosecution’s case beyond a reasonable doubt without having those text messages?," he asked.
He said that by contrast the defendant had gone out to prove his innocence even though he was not obliged to do so and had produced records and documents. Mr Shelley said the defendant’s account was far more plausible.
The fact that his client had been mistaken about a restaurant was not significant, he said, as "who can remember where they were for lunch on 24th January 2011?"
He said the prosecution had already urged the jury not to get sidetracked by minor inconsistencies and this was one such minor inconsistency.
A whole team of detectives had been "pouncing" on the defendant’s evidence to fact check elements of it yet with all the power and might of the State there was key evidence missing in the prosecution’s case, he said.
Mr Shelley also said fantasy was laid on top of reality in the complainant’s testimony about a visit to the defendant’s workplace which "contained a dangerous and shocking sexual encounter in a place where anyone could have walked in on them".
Mr Shelley asked the jury to "bear in mind you are making the most important decision about someone else’s life and it is based on the recall of someone 13 years ago".
He said the fact that she had "told the story to someone does not mean that version of the story is true".
If the jury had any doubt that the events complained of took place after the girl had turned 17 then the prosecution case falls away entirely and they must acquit, he said.
A reasonable doubt was like a road block on a journey and if they had any reasonable doubt they could not proceed. He suggested to the jury they would have many doubts about the charges.
He also said that the case was "not a referendum" on the complainant and there was only one person on trial, the defendant. He said there was only one rational result for "the man whose life hangs in the balance, who will never work again if convicted."
He said the prosecution’s case was that this man was a sex offender and that his parents had raised a sex offender.
Mr Shelley concluded by telling the jury that when they considered the facts there was only one possible result and that was not guilty on all counts.
The jury will now be instructed on the law by Judge Pauline Codd after which it will begin deliberating.
