A Sri Lankan cricketer who has been detained in Australia for almost a year while fighting a ‘stealthing’ charge in court will be free to return home after being found not guilty of sexual assault without consent.
Danushka Gunathilaka learned his fate on Thursday following a judge-alone trial at Downing Center District Court after pleading not guilty to the single charge.
Judge Sarah Huggett heard four days’ worth of evidence, including from the alleged victim who said the cricketer was ‘forceful’ and ‘aggressive’.
The 32-year-old batsman met the woman at the Sydney Opera Bar on November 2 last year after matching on Tinder while Gunathilaka was in Australia to play in the T20 World Cup.
Danushka Gunathilaka (pictured left outside court) has been found not guilty of sexual assault without consent
The court saw CCTV footage of the Sri Lankan cricket star with his Tinder date on the night of the alleged attack on November 2 last year (photo)
It was not in dispute that the pair had chatted several times via Tinder, Instagram and video calling on WhatsApp from October 31, before meeting three days later.
CCTV footage played in court shows the couple embracing as they meet and kiss as they wait for the ferry back to the woman’s home at around 11pm.
Judge Sarah Huggett found that while Mr Gunathilaka told the woman he preferred not to wear a condom, he used one during the encounter and had consensual sex with the woman.
After playing guitar and kissing on the sofa, the pair moved to the bedroom where the woman, who gave evidence via audiovisual link, told the court she had asked Mr Gunathilaka to use a condom but he allegedly said he ‘didn’t like it’. them’.
According to the woman’s evidence, Mr Gunathilaka said: ‘Don’t worry, I won’t get you pregnant, honey, don’t you trust me?’
“I remember him saying he hated them, he said something like, ‘I hate using condoms, I don’t like them, it doesn’t feel right that you have to trust me,'” the woman told the court .
Gunathilaka (pictured while being interviewed by police) used a condom while having consensual sex with the woman, Judge Sarah Huggett found
The star player was in Sydney for the Cricket World Cup when he was accused of ‘stealing’ his Tinder date
During his interrogation with police days later, Mr Gunathilaka admitted that he preferred to have sex without a condom, but denied that he did not want to use one with the woman.
He said: ‘I just said ‘I don’t normally like sex with condoms’, I didn’t say ‘I don’t want to have sex without a condom’.”
While the woman told the court that Mr Gunathilaka got up from bed thinking he was not wearing a condom, Judge Huggett found the woman’s version of events was incorrect and the cricketer used a condom the entire time.
Mr Gunathilaka was arrested at the Hyatt Regency in the early hours of November 6 and taken to Day Street Police Station where he answered questions for more than two hours.
The recorded interview shows the cricketer becoming emotional while talking about a spiritual conversation he had with the alleged victim, in which she said she had the power to ‘see the future’. He told police he was “interested” because he was a Buddhist.
“We were talking about religious things… that she can see in a past life and we talked about things like that,” he said in the interview as he broke down in tears.
Gunathilaka told police he normally preferred sex without a condom, but wore one while with his accuser
Gunathilaka told the officers that he asked the woman to tell him about his past life. He said she told him they were neighbors in Thailand.
The cricketer told police he became scared and “got the feeling” the woman was “a bit strange”, prompting him to leave. She ordered a taxi for him.
He was asked if he had ever put his penis “in her without a condom.”
“No, no, definitely not,” Mr Gunathilaka replied.
Under cross-examination by Mr Gunathilaka’s lawyer, Murugan Thangaraj SC, the woman denied that she was the one who raised the subject, telling the court that it was the cricketer who said they knew each other in a past life.
Crown prosecutor Gabrielle Steedman told the court the victim’s evidence “must be accepted beyond reasonable doubt” and that there was “no rational inference other than that the suspect had removed his condom.”
Gunathilaka (pictured outside court in Sydney on Thursday) told the court his accuser scared him when they talked about his past life
She argued that the cricketer was rough and did not ‘care or respect’ the woman’s requests or boundaries, and Mr Gunathilaka ‘pursued the woman quite relentlessly’.
Mr Thangaraj argued that the alleged victim told a story that had been ‘altered’ and ‘shaped to fit the allegation’.
He alleged that the woman had given false and self-serving evidence both in court and in her two statements to police.
“She often can’t remember things that don’t match her story,” he said.
The main issue in the trial was Gunathilaka’s state of mind as to whether or not he removed the condom without the woman’s knowledge, which is known as stealth.
A week after the trial ended, Judge Huggett disagreed with the Crown case on Thursday, ruling that Gunathilaka had not removed the condom during intercourse.
He was found not guilty and is free to return to his hometown of Colombo in Sri Lanka.