NRL superstar Jarryd Hayne is found GUILTY of two counts of sexual assault after jury in his first trial couldn’t return a verdict – ending victim’s two-and-a-half-year ordeal
- Jury has handed down a verdict in Jarryd Hayne’s second sexual assault trial
- Seven men and five women took three full days to come to a conclusion
- Hayne, 33, nervously clutched his wife Amelia Bonnici’s hand before verdict
- Hayne was accused of two counts of aggravated sexual assault in 2018
- He was returning from a bucks weekend and left a taxi running out the front
Jarryd Hayne has been found guilty of two counts of sexual assault by a jury in a sensational end to a two-and-a-half year saga.
A NSW District Court jury reached its sensational verdict just after 2pm on Monday following three full days of deliberations at Sydney’s Downing Centre.
Hayne, 33, dressed in a black suit and tie, bowed his head in the witness box as the first guilty verdict was entered. One of his lawyers later patted him on the arm.
But the famous former footballer, 33, was found not guilty of aggravating circumstances of recklessly inflicting actual bodily harm.
Judge Helen Syme said a jail sentence was ‘inevitable’ and that Hayne’s current bail conditions weren’t enough to mitigate the risk.
Whether Hayne walks or not remains up in the air, with the judge leaving the court as his lawyers speak to him.
Hayne had denied the then 26-year-old woman’s claims that he had sexually assaulted her after 9pm on Sunday, September 30, 2018.
Guilty: Jarryd Hayne shielded his face with dark sunglasses and clutched Ms Bonnici’s hand as he headed to court on Monday
The woman, then 26, claimed Hayne had sexually assaulted her, had been ‘really rough and pushy’, forcefully removed her clothes and left her bleeding from her genitalia.
The famous footballer’s rendezvous with the woman came after he had been celebrating a bucks weekend in Newcastle and paid a cab driver $550 to drive him back to Sydney.
Verdict at last: Jarryd Hayne held hands with his new wife Amelia Bonnici as the second jury trial came to a close
But he asked the driver to let him ‘pick up a bag’ from a nearby suburb, where the woman lived with her mother. The taxi was left out the front.
Hayne had met the woman via Instagram when she messaged him that he was ‘absolutely gorgeous’ about a year earlier.
The jury was told Hayne played an Ed Sheeran cover of Oasis’s Wonderwall in the woman’s room – when the driver rapped on the front door.
The woman became upset that the cab had was running and had said there was ‘no way’ she was going to have sex with him.
Shortly afterwards, she alleged he forcefully removed her clothes, was ‘really pushy and rough’ and left her scared.
She suffered cuts to her vagina which left her bleeding.
Hayne left soon after and she sent him a text message saying that ‘I’m hurting so much’.
‘I know I’ve talked about sex and stuff so much but I didn’t want to do that after knowing the taxi was waiting for you,’ she wrote in a follow-up text.
His only reply was ‘Go doctor tomorrow’.
Hayne never denied the couple had been intimate but his defence told the court that he believed she was saying no to sexual intercourse and consented to other acts.
The jury retired at 12.39pm last Wednesday and as of last Friday the court heard they had made ‘good progress’ toward a verdict.
Judge Helen Syme on Monday had urged the jury to put out of their minds community discussion about sexual assault that has appeared in the media recently.
A previous trial held in Newcastle last year ended after a jury failed to reach a verdict.
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