Hayne trial hears of blood after alleged sex assault

Jack Gramenz and Miklos Bolza | March 13, 2023

Former NRL star Jarryd Hayne allegedly hopped in a waiting taxi after sexually assaulting a woman he had never met before, a Sydney jury has been told.

The ex-international rugby league player is accused of forcibly performing sex acts on the woman in her NSW Hunter home on the night of the 2018 NRL grand final.

The 35-year-old’s third trial on two counts of sexual intercourse without consent began in the NSW District Court on Monday.

“Not guilty,” Hayne said when the charges were read.

He has consistently denied the alleged assault since being charged in November 2018.

The case has drawn attention because of Hayne’s high-profile as a former sports star.

“You’ll find out if you don’t already know,” Judge Graham Turnbull told prospective jurors on Monday.

He reminded those selected for the jury to keep an open mind and remain impartial.

“Concentrate on the evidence in this trial … this trial alone,” he said.

The jury of 14, seven men and seven women, will be whittled to 12 before a verdict is delivered.

Crown prosecutor John Sfinas told jurors they would hear Hayne and the woman he was accused of assaulting had never met, having communicated through social media.

Hayne’s barrister, Margaret Cunneen SC, told the jury he replied “politely” to the woman’s messages, which became increasingly sexual.

“He was a famous footballer. He didn’t know her,” she said.

Hayne was in town for a bucks’ weekend when he took a taxi to the woman’s home in suburban Newcastle.

He used a laptop to play an Ed Sheeran cover of Wonderwall he sang along with as the taxi waited outside, Mr Sfinas said.

She asked if the taxi was for him after hearing the honk of a horn.

Mr Sfinas said that was a “defining moment” for the woman.

She already felt “quite awkward” about the singing, but learning a taxi was waiting to drive Hayne to Sydney made her desire to have sex with him “evaporate”, Mr Sfinas said.

Hayne told her before he arrived that he was headed to Sydney but would stop by “on the way”, Ms Cunneen said.

A few days after the alleged assaults, when Hayne messaged the woman on Snapchat telling her he had lost his phone, she told him in writing that she had said “no”, Ms Cunneen said.

“That’s completely untrue! Everything we did you consented to,” Hayne wrote back in the messages that would be tendered as evidence, Ms Cunneen said.

“That in a nutshell is the defence case,” she said.

“It ended abruptly, and disappointingly perhaps, for all concerned … but nothing in that room is done against (her) will.”

The alleged assault involving oral and digital sex lasted about 30 seconds, ending when the woman’s genitals began to bleed, Mr Sfinas said.

Ms Cunneen said both Hayne and the woman washed blood off themselves in her ensuite bathroom before Hayne left.

She also helped Hayne remove some of her clothing, Ms Cunneen said, contrasting Mr Sfinas’ claim that he had pulled her jeans off after trying to kiss her in a way that was “quite forceful”.

Mr Sfinas said the jeans would be tendered as evidence.

Judge Turnbull told the jury evidence from the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, had already been recorded and would be played during the trial. 

Hayne was a star player for the Parramatta Eels in the NRL, represented NSW in State of Origin and played internationally for Australia and Fiji during his professional rugby league career.

The trial continues.