Members of a jury have been told to put aside any emotion before delivering their verdict as the child-abuse trial of Masterton man Ken O'Reilly nears its end.
The jury heard the closing addresses from Crown and defence lawyers on Friday at the Wellington District Court and were to hear Judge Bruce Davidson's summary of the case this morning.
The seven women and five men on the jury will then be given time to deliberate and are expected to return a verdict this afternoon.
Kenneth Robert O'Reilly, 66, a former railway signalman, is on trial for indecently assaulting or committing an indecent act against two girls aged under 16, with seven charges relating to a girl under the age of 12. Initially he faced 16 charges but Crown prosecutors amended that to 12 counts on Friday after both cases had been heard.
The offences are alleged to have taken place between 1982 and 2006.
O'Reilly denies all charges.
Crown prosecutor Dale La Hood said the case against the accused was a simple one for the jury to decide. He said that starting in the 1960s O'Reilly had "developed a desire to sexually abuse children that are close to him". The two complainants were "honest and reliable" witnesses, and along with the evidence of a third propensity witness, the Crown's case involved similar offending against three young girls unconnected with one another. It "defied common sense" to accept the defence's argument that the charges were invented by the complainants, he said.
"That the accused is the victim of some extraordinary coincidence - it's utterly implausible."
He said the accused and his wife, Kathleen O'Reilly, had tried to downplay the relationships they had with the families of the complainants to make it seem there would be little or no opportunity to abuse the two girls. But Mr La Hood said the couple's evidence bore "all the hallmarks of a joint reconstruction".
He said understandably Mrs O'Reilly was "hoping against hope" her husband was innocent, but the Crown evidence, and that of the complainants, was undeniable. "Mr O'Reilly simply cannot accept what he has done."
Defence lawyer Mike Antunovic said the jury had to look past the emotive nature of the allegations and simply look at the facts, saying: "Matters of this kind always invoke strong feelings in right-minded citizens." He told the jury to forget the testimony of the 53-year-old witness who spoke of O'Reilly having sex with her in a field when she was aged 8. No charges were ever laid in relation to those claims.
He said nobody had seen the alleged offending by O'Reilly, and no witness could remember seeing signs of distress in either of the complainants.
If the first complainant, now 35, had told her sister of the abuse when she was 14, why had that sister not given evidence to that effect? The sister had not appeared as a witness and yet the jury was being asked to believe she knew of the allegations at a young age.
He said the first complainant had been through years of treatment and therapy for schizophrenia.
The allegations were "the product of an unbalanced mind".
The allegations by the second complainant that the accused had rubbed against her and smacked her bottom were simply a cry for help. "I won't ask you, and I can't ask you, to like Ken O'Reilly. But I will ask you to give him a fair trial," Mr Antunovic said.
Judge Davidson was expected to finish his final summary before midday today.
Read earlier story - Sex abuse claims 'untrue'
Verdict looms in child sex trial
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