Luka Phillips pleads not guilty to aggravated robbery of Nightcliff BWS

A MAN with a conspicuously “large bulge” in his pants - that one witness said was about ‘seven inches’ - at the Nightcliff BWS was confronted by a security guard and ultimately being charged with aggravated robbery, the Supreme Court has heard.

Luka Phillips has pleaded not guilty to aggravated robbery and denies a “large bulge” in his crotch was a bottle of stolen grog.

A MAN with a conspicuously “large bulge” in his pants at the Nightcliff BWS was confronted by a security guard and ultimately being charged with aggravated robbery, the Supreme Court has heard.

Luka Phillips has pleaded not guilty and denies the allegation he stole a bottle of spirits from the store.

He further denies the allegation he pulled a knife on the security guard because he was stopped from leaving.

Crown Prosecutor Lucy Hopkinson said an inventory check of the store the day after the alleged robbery found a bottle of cognac missing.

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The attendant who served Mr Phillips, Jose Patalinghug, said he first noticed the “bulge” as Phillips approached the counter with a carton of beer.

Mr Patalinghug described the shape of the bulge as “elongated”.

When asked by Ms Hopkinson where the bulge was, Mr Patalinghug said: “in front of his underwear”.

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When asked by Ms Hopkinson whether the bulge “appeared to be on one side in particular, to fall on one side in particular”, Mr Patalinghug said: “I think it was in the middle, as far as I can remember”.

Asked how “elongated” in shape and what dimensions the bulge was, Mr Patalinghug gestured with his hands and said: “probably around seven”.

Justice Peter Barr clarified Mr Patalinghug’s answer and said: “so, a bulge of around seven inches, thankyou”.

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Mr Patalinghug told the court he could not recall “how thick” the bulge seemed.

Under cross examination from Phillips’s barrister, Tamzin Lee, Mr Patalinghug said it was “possible” that what he was as a “bulge” could have been there before Phillips approached the store’s bourbon and whisky shelf.

Ms Lee said: “You don’t know the way in which the fabric over Mr Phillips’s crotch fell, do you?”

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Mr Patalinghug said: “It was just pants”.

Ms Lee said: “I put it to you that there was no bulge in the shape of a bottle in Mr Phillips’s pants”.

Mr Patalinghug said: “I don’t think so”.

He said after the alleged robbery and Phillips’s scuffle with a security guard, he did not search the store for a missing bottle or security tag.

The alleged offending dates from the night of July 14, 2018.

The trial continues before Justice Peter Barr and ten jurors of 13 originally empanelled jurors.