Woman allegedly raped by cop ‘tends to exaggerate’ and ‘wanted to laugh it off’, court hears

A woman who was allegedly raped by an NT Police officer ‘just wanted to laugh it off’ after the first time he ‘stripped (her) off’ and assaulted her, a court has heard.

A WOMAN who was allegedly raped by an NT Police officer “just wanted to laugh it off” after the first time he “stripped (her) off” and assaulted her, a court has heard.

Patrick Carson, 39, has pleaded not guilty in the Supreme Court to two counts of raping the then 19-year-old, who prosecutors say saw him as a “father figure”, in 2020.

In giving evidence on Friday, a close friend of the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court she had received a text from her on the day of the first alleged incident saying “I need help”.

The witness said she called the woman, who was “pretty hysterical”, and it took about five or 10 minutes to calm her down.

She said the woman told her Carson had offered to give her a massage at his home and she “thought he just didn’t realise what he was doing” before he “stripped me off and fingered me”.

“You asked her ‘Did he ask if he could take your clothes off?’ and she said ‘Yeah, I didn’t know what to do, I literally couldn’t speak, I was face down and I just nodded my head’,” Crown prosecutor Marty Aust said.

“Ultimately, at some point she said she’s OK and she just wanted to laugh it off, and as far as you were aware, everything in the relationship that she and Mr Carson had went back to normal after that.”

Under cross examination by Carson’s barrister, Mary Chalmers SC, the witness agreed her friend “tends to exaggerate” and 40 per cent of messages between them were about “her having a crisis”.

“(She) did often call me with things that had happened to her in the course of her life in Darwin,” she said.

Ms Chalmers asked: “Do you remember her telling you about the time someone tried to grab her off her bike, a man came out of the bush?”

“There were a number of times (she told me) something like that happened,” she replied.

Patrick Carson arrives at court. Picture: Glenn Campbell

Another witness told the court she got a call from the woman on the day of the second alleged incident, and she was “really distressed”.

“She told me that Paddy had been over and they had been sitting on the couch and he had pretended to go to sleep and he had laid on top of her and he tried to kiss her again and he had put her hand in her shirt,” she said.

She said after Carson messaged saying he was coming back, the two women locked all the doors, turned off all the lights, closed the blinds and hid in a back bedroom.

“We were being quiet and just trying to pretend like we weren’t there, pretty much, she was still pretty upset about everything,” she said.

“I tried to convince (her) to call the police but she didn’t want to.”

The trial continues on Monday.