A jury in Northern Ireland has heard details of the alleged rape of a child by the former Democratic Unionist party (DUP) leader Jeffrey Donaldson.<\/p>\n
A police interview with the complainant was played to Newry crown court in Northern Ireland on Tuesday on the sixth day of the former MP\u2019s trial for alleged sex offences.<\/p>\n
Witness B, who is now an adult, described the alleged assault and said she still lived with the memory. \u201cThe actions that night I will never forget, what happened that night will live with me for ever.\u201d<\/p>\n
Donaldson, 63, faces 18 charges, including one count of rape, which span from 1985 to 2008 and involve two alleged victims. His wife, Eleanor, 60, is charged with aiding and abetting rape and indecent assault. Both deny all the charges.<\/p>\n
In the interview, recorded at a police station in March 2024, the complainant said that as a child she had been sexually abused by the then MP and had felt she could not confide in anyone. \u201cI remember telling my imaginary friend.\u201d<\/p>\n
She detailed two alleged incidents, the first while she was of primary school age. \u201cI remember being really still and all I could hear was his breath.\u201d She alleged he had put his hands down her pants and she recalled thinking: \u201cPlease, let this be it.\u201d<\/p>\n
After describing the alleged assault in more detail, she said: \u201cI hated it yet I thought if I pretend to be asleep he\u2019ll just stop and lose interest. I thought: what\u2019s the point in shouting?\u201d The next day she had felt \u201csick\u201d and \u201canxious\u201d, she said.<\/p>\n
The complainant said she had been of secondary school age during the alleged second incident. \u201cHe lifted up my top and started playing with my breasts.\u201d She alleged that Donaldson\u2019s wife had witnessed part of the incident and walked away.<\/p>\n
Donaldson, wearing a dark blue suit, sat in the dock, took notes and on occasion shook his head. Eleanor Donaldson, who has been judged unfit to stand trial on mental health grounds, was not present. She is facing a trial of the facts, which tests the evidence but cannot result in a criminal conviction.<\/p>\n
The complainant said that when she was a teenager a Christian centre had brokered a meeting with Donaldson, during which he allegedly apologised \u201cfor what he had done to me in the past\u201d.<\/p>\n
Kieran Vaughan, a barrister for the former MP, challenged the complainant\u2019s memory, saying she could not remember her age at the time of the alleged rape. He suggested the event had not happened and asked her why she had not told anyone at the time.<\/p>\n
She replied: \u201cIt was my biggest mistake, not telling anybody back then. I regret that every day. I didn\u2019t know the words, I knew it was wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n
The trial continues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A jury in Northern Ireland has heard details of the alleged rape of a child by the former…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":479604,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":["post-479603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/479603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=479603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/479603\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/479604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=479603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=479603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=479603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}