KEY POINTS:
The man at the centre of a police pepper-spraying incident has been found guilty of indecent assault.
Scott MacDonald made headlines after a TV3 cameraman filmed him being sprayed as he lay handcuffed on the ground outside the Fight for Life celebrity boxing event in May 2006, sparking
an independent Police Complaints Authority investigation.
The 35-year-old was charged with resisting arrest and assaulting an officer immediately after the incident and an additional charge of indecent assault followed seven weeks later.
The later charge was laid after Constable Joshua Jones, one of the officers at the centre of the internal inquiry, visited a 17-year-old who had been working at the event.
The woman, who is now 19 and cannot be named for legal reasons, had spoken to police at the event about offensive comments that were made by MacDonald while she was serving drinks.
An allegation he groped her backside surfaced only when Jones visited her home to get her to sign a statement seven weeks later.
In the Auckland District Court last week, MacDonald denied the indecent assault allegation, with his lawyer Chris Comeskey questioning why it took police so long to lay the additional charge.
He suggested the later charge was a convenient way of taking pressure off Jones, who was in trouble for his overzealous arrest of MacDonald.
He also raised credibility issues about the complainant, who had admitted she had first told police she was 18 to avoid difficulties she might have encountered because she had been serving alcohol as a 17-year-old.
The complainant told the court that MacDonald was heavily intoxicated on that night and had been making "rude" remarks at her, such as "you're hot" and "hey baby, come sit on my lap".
She said that MacDonald then "grabbed my ass, groped it and then I pushed him away". She spoke to two police officers at the event and asked if they could keep an eye on MacDonald because he was "drunk".
Police then confronted MacDonald and dragged him outside where he was handcuffed and pepper-sprayed before being taken away and charged.
The complainant told the court that as police left the venue, one officer said "we've got him for you".
Under cross-examination, the woman denied she knew Jones was under investigation for pepper-spraying the accused.
She said when he visited her home to go over her statement she casually mentioned that MacDonald had grabbed her bottom and it was then Jones said that should be included in her statement.
"We have a string of events here that could best be described as dodgy," Comeskey told the jury.
"Police went there [the home of the complainant] with indecent assault on the agenda.
"This happened seven weeks later. It is so bizarre it is absurd. It's an easy allegation to make, a difficult charge to refute."
But Crown prosecutor Scott McColgan said it was ridiculous to suggest that the woman had made a false complaint to help out the police.
The jury agreed and convicted MacDonald.
Comeskey has now filed an appeal with the Court of Appeal in a bid to have the conviction quashed.
