Lawyers accusing a woman of tricking her female friend into sex disguised as a man told a jury her defence was ‘a nonsense’.
Gayle Newland, 25, is accused of using the online persona of ‘Kye Fortune’ to seduce her female friend over a two year period, before tricking her into wearing a blindfold and sexually assaulting her with a ‘strap-on’ prosthetic penis.
Newland, of Hooton Road in Willaston, near Neston, denies five counts of sexual assault and told a jury at Chester Crown Court that her accuser knew she was having sex with a woman.
Matthew Corbett-Jones, prosecuting, told the jury the issue of whether the alleged victim could have consented to sex was ‘inextricably linked’ to whether she was deceived.
Delivering his closing speech on day five of the trial, he said: “We all have different backgrounds, different experiences of life. We may have different jobs, different experiences of family life. There may be cultural differences and we may have different sexualities.
“But each one of us has something in common, we all have the absolute right and freedom to choose when and in what circumstances we agree to have sexual intercourse with another person. It is a fundamental right in a civilised society and a right protected by law.”
Mr Corbett-Jones described the complainant as a ‘vulnerable and naïve’ girl, and claimed she was ‘devastated’ by the alleged sexual assaults.
He said: “Experience of life shows that these people do exist, there are people who are naive and trusting and vulnerable, and all these factors are things the defendant accepts.”
He highlighted internet and phone messages between the pair and the fact Newland used a separate phone to text as Kye.
He said: “It is a nonsense to suggest, for example, that she would have been texting Kye to ask for someone’s telephone number if that was not a belief she had in a real person.
“It is a nonsense that she would have been texting Newland to say she was going to lend money off Kye the following week.”
Earlier the jury were told of an email sent from Newland shortly after the relationship ended, titled: “Explanation as best I can at the moment.”
Extracts included: “I hope you received my text the other day, This all started when I was 13, a kid, since then it became the norm, finally I felt I had a chance to channel the real me, because I could not in my own skin.”
It also said: “I know Kye is who I am, it’s my real personality” and “I had to make up lies, to uncover the initial lies.”
Mr Corbett-Jones said: “I am suggesting that you (Newland) began that email in the way you did because you had never told her before.”
Newland repeated her claim that she was ‘apologising for something she never did’ in a ‘desperate’ attempt to maintain her relationship with the complainant.
She said: “If it was a genuine admission I would have mentioned the blindfold, the scarf, and all the other absurd things she said.”
Newland said her accuser was paranoid and she had concerns over her ‘state of mind’ at the time she sent the email.
She said: “She believed things had happened that had not, at uni, at work, she talked about them like they actually happened. Every single day something went wrong for her, I believed every single thing she said and now I know none of that was true.”
Newland was also questioned over texts where she referred to ‘my Catfish’, a term used to describe a person lying about their identity online.
She maintained that she told her accuser she used the persona of Kye Fortune to talk to girls online, due to feeling awkward about her sexuality.
She said the complainant added the facebook profile of Kye Fortune knowing that it was really Newland.
Proceeding.
