A woman who claims she was sexually assaulted by a Como restaurateur has told a court she thought she was going to be raped in the carpark of Lago Di Como after the man allegedly pushed her up against a wall and forced himself on her.
Alberto Nicoletti, 32, is on trial in the Perth District Court, accused of sexually assaulting eight intoxicated women, one of whom alleges he and his friend raped her in a Scarborough public toilet after pretending to be a gay couple and offering her cocaine.
Alberto Nicoletti is facing sexual penetration charges.Credit: Facebook
On Wednesday, a 28-year-old woman, who cannot be named, told the court she met Nicoletti while on a night out with a friend in 2016.
She claimed Nicoletti offered the women a ride home around 11pm, and told them he needed to stop at his restaurant Lago Di Como to pick something up on the way.
Nicoletti invited them inside, along with a male friend. The woman, who was 21 years old at the time, told the court she had left Nicoletti’s restaurant to retrieve her phone from his car when he approached her from behind and attacked her.
She told the court Nicoletti was trying to get her into the car and forced himself on her.
“I was trying to get out of the car,” she said.
“I rolled over onto my back and was shimmying out as best I could, I went to walk back to the restaurant to get my friend, but Alberto pushed me up against the wall.
“I froze for a bit because I didn’t know what he was doing. He tried to kiss my neck and put his hand up my skirt. I tried to call [my friend] but she didn’t hear me. His forearm was up against my chest and his other hand was going up my skirt.”
Nicoletti denied the charge of sexual penetration without consent in relation to the night, and claimed that while the incident did happen, the sexual encounter was consensual.
His defence barrister Tom Percy, KC, told the court the woman lied about the incident because she had a boyfriend at the time, and put it to her that she “felt bad” because her friend was interested in Nicoletti, which the woman denied.
Percy: “You felt bad, didn’t you, because your girlfriend was interested in him?”
The complainant: “No.”
[The friend] fancied him, which you knew? – That’s not true.
You didn’t want to cut her lunch, did you? – That’s not true.
You were effectively cheating on your boyfriend even being there? – No.
The woman claimed she left the restaurant with her friend after telling her Nicoletti tried to rape her outside.
She told the court the two women “ran in separate directions”, forcing her to hide behind bins because she was lost and didn’t know the area.
The woman told the court she tried to call her parents and her partner for help and was crying hysterically on the phone. A woman who overheard her called police and took her to a nearby police station.
On Wednesday, the woman’s friend who was with her on the night in question gave evidence that the two of them were well aware they were heading straight to the restaurant with the men after they met at the bar in Northbridge.
She denied Nicoletti said he would drop them off home and that stopping at the restaurant was a last-minute detour, but said once there, her friend had disappeared for a short period and then returned “distressed” and “panicked” and told her she wanted to leave.
Nicoletti is facing charges of sexual penetration without consent, deprivation of liberty, and unlawful and indecent assault over the alleged sexual assault of eight women over the course of 4½ years, while his friend Vincenzo Mineo faces charges of sexual penetration without consent relating to two of the cases.
The men, now 32 and 39 years old respectively, were arrested and charged in 2021.
The trial continues.
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