May 10, 2021 — 3.01pm Footballer Jack de Belin has been found not guilty of one charge of sexually assaulting a 19-year-old woman he met at a Wollongong nightclub, with a jury discharged after it was unable to reach a verdict on the remaining four charges against him.
Mr de Belin, who plays for NRL club St George Illawarra, and Callan Sinclair, who plays for the Shellharbour Sharks, faced a 2½-week trial in the NSW District Court accused of raping a crying woman in the bedroom of Mr de Belin’s cousin, who wasn’t home, in the early hours of December 9, 2018.
Jack de Belin arrives at court during the trial. Jack de Belin arrives at court during the trial. RHETT WYMAN
Both pleaded not guilty to five counts each of aggravated sexual assault, maintaining their encounter with the woman was a consensual threesome. It was the second trial they faced on the charges, after a trial last year ended in a hung jury.
On Monday, after five days of deliberations, a jury of eight men and four women found Mr de Belin and Mr Sinclair not guilty of one of one charge each, relating to one sexual act allegedly performed by Mr de Belin. The Crown had alleged Mr Sinclair was also liable for this act because he was taking part in a joint criminal enterprise.
The jury was discharged after they were unable to reach a unanimous or majority verdict on the remaining four charges, which related to other sexual acts allegedly performed by the men.
“Each juror is firm and resolute in their verdict,” the jurors wrote in a note.
Judge Nicole Noman stood the case over to May 28 for the prosecution to consider its position.
In her evidence, the woman said she met the men at a nightclub, Mr Crown, on the evening of December 8 and believed they were taking a bike taxi to another club, but instead they went to a unit in North Wollongong. She initially declined to go inside, she said, then went in to use the toilet.
The woman said that, while she was using the toilet, Mr de Belin walked into the en suite bathroom naked so she left the room. She said that, when Mr de Belin emerged, he undid her top, pushed her onto a bed and removed the rest of her clothing, then started “having sex with me” despite her saying “no”.
Callan Sinclair outside court during the trial. Callan Sinclair outside court during the trial. EDWINA PICKLES
“I couldn’t do anything about it, no one was listening to me,” the woman said. “I had tears coming out of my eyes instead ... by that time I was just going dead and numb inside.”
She said Mr Sinclair undressed and joined in, taking Mr de Belin’s place, before the pair swapped several times.
“They were both cheering each other on. Jack de Belin was going, ‘Yeah Cal, keep going,’ ” the woman said.
“I was dead inside, I was numb, I was crying – that’s all I was doing,” she said. “Then they swapped over again.”
In a phone call played to the trial, Mr de Belin told his State of Origin teammate Angus Crichton that he was “not too worried” and was going to get off the charge, “it’s just that my image is tarnished” and his partner was pregnant.
He said he was baffled the woman went to police, because it had been a standard “bun” – a slang term for a threesome – and “she’s never once said ‘no’, never once not given consent”.
Mr Sinclair told his mother in a recorded phone call that the “chick” was “hanging around us like a bad smell all night”. In another call, Mr de Belin told Mr Sinclair, “make sure you back yourself because you know for a fact we didn’t force sexual assault on her”.
In closing arguments, Crown prosecutor David Scully said the woman “was a compelling witness and you can believe her”.
He said Mr de Belin thought he could do whatever he wanted and was “leading the way in that bedroom”, with Mr Sinclair making “the wrong choice to join in”.
RELATED ARTICLE Jack de Belin arrives at court on Monday. DE BELIN TRIAL Witness in Jack de Belin case had flashback that came to him in a dream, court told But Mr Sinclair’s barrister Sharyn Hall said the woman’s evidence was inaccurate and inconsistent, including being captured on CCTV “laughing uproariously” with Mr de Belin and Mr Sinclair following the alleged rape, at a time when she said she wanted to get away from them.
Ms Hall said the court was “not a court of morals” and jurors should put to one side their thoughts about threesomes, football players generally and the fact Mr de Belin cheated on his pregnant girlfriend.
Mr de Belin’s barrister David Campbell, SC, said there was a significant body of evidence contradicting the Crown case, and each man had “forcefully, emphatically, repeatedly – and consistently, most importantly – denied that there was anything untoward about what happened”.
“That is, everything that took place at those premises on that night was consensual.”