A north-east man at the centre of an alleged nightclub sexual assault trial has admitted he lied to police but denies any deliberate contact with his accuser – claiming “it wasn’t me”.
Daniel Rougvie, 32, is accused of having “grabbed” the bum of a 26-year-old woman while on a night out with friends at Aberdeen’s Prohibition nightspot in February 2019.
The former delivery driver – who has lost his job as a result of the trial – originally faced seven charges including sexual assault, repeatedly punching the alleged victim’s boyfriend to his “severe injury” and attempting to bite a police officer.
Rougvie was also facing charges of assaulting the woman’s 49-year old partner with knuckledusters – but this was removed from the indictment after a submission by his defence solicitor, Iain McGregor.
Rougvie has now pleaded guilty to four charges: assaulting the 49-year old man by repeatedly punching him, being in possession of knuckledusters, assaulting a police officer and of resisting arrest.
He now faces a single charge of sexual assault.
Rougvie told a jury at Aberdeen Sheriff Court yesterday that while he “cannot comment” on whether the alleged female victim was grabbed on the bum, he said “I didn’t touch her.”
Asked by fiscal depute Felicity Merson if he was attempting to provoke a violent situation by squeezing the woman’s buttock, Rougvie said: “Anything that’s said by her about being touched, I cannot comment on that. But what I can say is that it wasn’t me.
The 32-year-old also described claims by the woman’s boyfriend that he admitted touching her immediately afterwards as “ridiculous”.
However, Rougvie did admit that he lied during a police interview later that same day.
Reading out a section of the interview, Ms Merson put it to Rougvie that he told police he “did not hit anybody with any form of weapon, including my hands, my head or any other part of my body”.
“Now, that was a lie?” she asked.
Rougvie replied: “Yes, it was there, yes.”
“So why did you lie to the police?” Ms Merson asked.
He replied: “Probably because it was half 12 in the afternoon, it was the end of a long interview.”
Ms Merson asked: “But you didn’t have to implicate yourself. Is that fair?”
“Well I’d already been implicated, so I didn’t want to tell the police. They were asking me questions I had no idea about and I hadn’t spoken to a solicitor at all,” Rougvie replied.
During final speeches to the jury, Mr McGregor suggested they put evidence given by Sergeant Iain Fraser “to one side” due to Mr McGregor’s claim the officer had “worked backwards” to find “anything that would support what the allegations were”.
Sheriff Summers will give his charges to the court today, at which point the jury will be asked to consider its verdict.
The case continues.
