Two Christchurch men have been found guilty of either stupefying or disabling 17 women, and sexually assaulting 12 of them, following a multi-year police investigation into drink spiking at inner city bar Mama Hooch and a local restaurant.
The now-convicted rapists were found guilty on or admitted to a total of 68 charges between them at a trial in the Christchurch District Court, following a spate of allegations at the bar between 2015 and 2018.
The extraordinary trial was held over six weeks in February and March and involved dozens of witnesses, including 30 women who recounted terrifying experiences at either Mama Hooch or a local restaurant.
However, the details were kept secret until today under a strict blanket suppression order, to protect the fair trial rights of another man associated with the case. Some suppressions lifted today but 1News remains unable to name the two men involved.
It comes following a multi-year investigation into drink spiking at inner city bar Mama Hooch and a local restaurant. (Source: 1News)
In his opening, Crown prosecutor Andrew McCrae argued the men were involved in “planned drugging” of young women, to enable sexual activity in circumstances “where they did not consent, nor were they capable of consenting”.
“They acted together in a common purpose… targeting them for sexual conquest, isolating them, plying them with free alcohol, and on occasions, administering illicit stupefying substances to them,” he told the court.
Both men denied the charges – and successfully defended some of the allegations in court – but by the end of the trial the judge found they had drugged 17 women between them, with the drugs either slipped into drinks or given to women under false pretences.
The court heard that on one occasion in 2018, one of the men took two women to a restaurant to snort what he claimed was the party drug MDMA.
In evidence heard in court, the woman said the substance burnt her nose as soon as she consumed it.
“Seconds later, it was hard for me to see, it was hard for me to hear, I couldn’t physically walk on my own, it was hard for me to do anything myself,” she said in a police interview, played in court.
“From that point on everything just went really, really, really, really blurry. I remember me and [my friend] trying to help each other to walk and we were screaming at him, 'What did you give us?’”
Both women recounted black outs - saying when they came to, they were being sexually assaulted.
“It felt like I’ve dived into a pool, like I was underwater, like I couldn’t hear, I couldn’t see, I was not in control of my body, I felt like a walking doll,” she said.
Prosecutors also found drugs at one of the men’s homes, and uncovered a Whatsapp group chat, where the men joked about a date-rape drug.
In the message, one wrote: “I just roofied [a woman’s] drink”.
A friend responded: “Did you buy her a ‘Roofiecolada?’”
On a separate occasion, another woman described experiencing memory loss after consuming drugs with the men.
“I just remember I was asking for a lot of water, my mouth was so dry, I’ve never, ever felt that, it was crazy,” she said in a police interview played in court.
The woman’s next memory was being raped.
The assault was filmed, with the video later played in court.
“All that was going through my head is, can I even say no to what’s happening?” she told police.
These stories are just two of the many disabling or stupefying incidents alleged in court, with the accounts eventually overwhelming the men’s claims of innocence.
They were found guilty of a host of charges between them including rape, stupefying, disabling, sexual violation, making an intimate visual recording, indecent assault, assault and offering to supply a class B drug.
Their name suppression was initially lifted by the District Court today but both men lodged appeals to the High Court, in an attempt to keep their identifies secret, meaning they can’t be named today.
They are due to face sentence in July.
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