Christian Porter historic rape allegation: accuser thought they would marry
The woman who alleges she was raped by Attorney-General Christian Porter “reassured” herself in the six years afterwards that the pair would one day be married.
NSW
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The woman who alleges she was raped by Attorney-General Christian Porter “reassured” herself in the six years afterwards that the pair would one day be married.
Mr Porter has strenuously denied the woman’s claims he raped her when they were both teenagers in 1988, allegations she has detailed in an unsworn statement circulated to politicians, media and the police.
ABC’s Four Corners last night named the woman at the centre of the allegation as Kate, and disclosed selective details of the statement she compiled before taking her own life in June 2020.
Among the details not included in the Four Corners’ report was Kate’s belief she would marry Mr Porter, according to her account in a “dossier” intended for South Australian police in February last year.
“All I could cope with, as I remembered parts of the night before, gingerly, was the idea that things had gone ‘a bit too far’ with (Mr Porter), the previous evening,” she said.
“But it was ok, I reassured myself, because we were going to get married — one day.”
In her statement Kate suggested the idea of marrying Mr Porter followed a compliment he had given her prior to the alleged rape. She said he had told her she would “make a wonderful wife one day” after she had ironed a shirt for him.
She indicated in the dossier that: “I continued to believe that he and I would, ultimately, get married, for several years … until I finally ended my relationship with him in Perth in 1994.”
The SA coroner is weighing up whether to launch an inquest into her death.
NSW Police detectives met Kate in Sydney in February last year. But in an email sent to NSW Police on June 23, Kate indicated she did not wish to proceed with the complaint.
Two days later SA Police advised their NSW counterparts she had died. NSW Police have confirmed they are no longer investigating as there was “insufficient admissible evidence to proceed”.
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WOMEN’S RAPE ALLEGATION ‘NOT IGNORED:’ PAYNE
The decision not to hold an independent inquiry into historic rape allegations against Attorney-General Christian Porter does not mean the matter was “ignored in any form,” Women’s Minister Marise Payne says.
Ms Payne has defended the government’s response to a woman’s allegations she was raped by Mr Porter when they were both teenagers in 1988, which he has strongly denied.
“We are having a very broad national discussion about the treatment of women and about safety and about workplaces and about relationships,” Ms Payne said.
“That is driven in part, in large part, by recent events.”
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has so far resisted calls from Labor, crossbench MPs, lawyers and supporters of the woman, for an independent inquiry to be held after NSW Police confirmed it had closed the investigation.
Ms Payne said the lack of legal avenues to investigate the matter did not mean the broader implications of the allegations raised by the woman were being avoided.
“Issues that have been raised … have resulted in an independent review of Parliament House as a workplace,” she said.
“They have resulted in a very broad national discussion about the treatment of women in the workplace and more broadly, and I don’t think that we can say that they are being ignored.”
The woman took her own life in June last year, but her allegations were made public by a group of friends who sent a dossier of information to several journalists and MPs, including Mr Morrison.
Mr Porter outed himself as the person at the centre of the allegations last week, strongly denied wrongdoing, and is now on a brief period of mental health leave.
The deceased woman’s family have publicly backed an independent inquiry into the matter.
Ms Payne said members of the government “at the highest levels” had “discussed these issues”.
“There has been a full and comprehensive statement made by the Attorney-General in relation to these matters, including the fact that the formal allegations were not put to him … by law enforcement and indeed not in detail by the media before they were aired publicly,” she said.
Ms Payne said she believed it was “very important” to work through the “well-established processes” in the justice system for determining if criminal allegations could be proven.
But Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce has broken rank with his Coalition colleagues to publicly call for an independent inquiry into the matter to avoid the allegations hanging “like a fog” over Mr Porter’s “remarkable career”.
“Christian Porter may not want an independent inquiry but he has got one by default,” Mr Joyce wrote on his Facebook page.
“A demeaning, cathartic inquisition by the press and opposition.”
Mr Joyce said he did not want Mr Porter to end up on the backbench sat “under the exit sign where my colleagues have kindly placed me”.
“Christian knows many in the opposition and some on his own side don’t want the truth unless it comes with his head on a plate. They just want his scalp,” he said.
“They will ultimately get what they want unless he can refer them to a deliberation on the allegation, beyond reasonable questions of efficacy.”
The South Australian coroner is weighing up whether to launch on inquest into the woman’s death in June 2020.
NSW Police detectives met with the woman in Sydney in February last year, and had contact with her on at least five occasions over the following three months.
However in an email sent to NSW Police on June 23 the woman indicated she did not wish to proceed with the complaint.
Two days later SA Police advised their NSW counterparts the woman had died.
NSW police have confirmed they are no longer investigating as there was “insufficient admissible evidences to proceed”.
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