Man Cleared Of Raping Woman He Met In Paceville, Court Rules She Consented To Sex But Regretted It Later
A man has been cleared of charges that he raped a woman he had met while out in Paceville five years ago after the courts found inconsistencies in the alleged victim’s version of events.
The case goes back to October 2017, when Turkish national Murat Durmaz met a Swedish igaming worker in Paceville and took her home with him.
According to the woman, Durmaz started following her as she was walking home after a night drinking. She said that he invited her to his home, that she accepted his offer, and that she remembers walking out onto his balcony, sipping a vodka lemonade and dipping her hand in his jacuzzi.
She said she couldn’t remember how she ended up having sex with him in his bed but could recall screaming after realising what was going on. She went on to claim that he placed a sharp object against her neck and warned her to shut up, but that she eventually managed to grab her bag and rush downstairs in her underwear.
The woman said the man followed her and gave her €20 to get a taxi home, but instead she went to the police to report him for rape.
However, when testifying in the case, Durmaz provided the court with a different version of events.
He said that he actually met the woman at a Paceville bar and that she took an interest in him, asking him questions about his life, acting impressed when he informed her he was a village consul and even sending him a Facebook friend request.
Eventually, they left the bar together and headed off to the TwentyTwo nightclub, but found it closed and decided to go to his place.
The accused said that sex was consensual and the ‘victim’ even asked him for a massage.
A medical expert testified that the alcohol levels in the alleged victim’s bloodstream show she was “highly intoxicated” at the time of the incident.
Faced with contradictory versions of events, magistrate Joe Mifsud ruled in favour of the accused after finding inconsistencies in the alleged victim’s story.
He pointed out that she had been out with her friends but left them to hang out with a stranger, whose invitation to go home with him she willingly accepted.
Mifsud noted that while the woman was able to recall the man’s home in significant detail, she appeared to suffer “total amnesia” when it came to remembering how they started having sex with each other.
He also said that medical checks didn’t indicate that the sex was carried out against her will.
Taking everything into consideration, the magistrate ruled that the woman was “looking for an adventure that night” and consented to have sex with him but later regretted her decision.
Lawyers Franco Debono and Marion Camilleri were representing the accused.
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