A volunteer bus driver has gone on trial accused of raping a vulnerable young woman after taking her to a psychiatric appointment.
Robert Day, 72, appeared at the High Court in Aberdeen yesterday to deny a charge of raping the woman in the car park at Balmedie Beach when she was in her late teens.
It is alleged that the offence took place when the grandfather was driving her back to a children’s home in Aberdeenshire following a therapy session at Royal Cornhill Hospital in Aberdeen.
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Prosecutors claim that the woman was “incapable of giving consent, by reason of mental disorder”.
They say that she was driven to a secluded spot by the beach “against her will” on Thursday November 24, 2016.
Day, who lives on Chapelhill Place in Ellon and helped out with a community bus charity, does not deny having sex with the teenager but maintains that she “seduced” him.
The jury of eight women and seven men were shown footage of an interview with the alleged victim in which she described “feeling really uncomfortable and scared” during the alleged attack inside Day’s Skoda Octavia.
She said: “I told him to get off me but he wouldn’t.”
Giving evidence, Detective Constable Joanne Cruickshank read a statement she took from the woman on the day in question.
The woman told police: “He told me it didn’t matter about age. I was trying to escape and went for the door handle but he got me.
“On the way back I didn’t speak and he told me to zip it and keep my mouth shut.”
Footage of a police interview with the accused, conducted four days after the alleged offence, was also shown.
Day broke down in tears as he told officers that his “lapse” had led to the breakdown of his marriage.
He said: “I was a fool, my marriage is over and I have to sell my house as my wife says she can no longer live with me.
“I’m a stupid, stupid man.”
But the accused insisted he did not rape the woman.
He added: “She was being so seductive.”
One of the woman’s social workers described her as “lacking an understanding of social situations”.
The social worker added: “She struggled at school and needs additional support at college.”
The trial, before Lord Mulholland, continues today.
