Jarryd Hayne secured his freedom from prison on Wednesday after his rape conviction was quashed in a landmark decision for the footy superstar.
Hayne, 36, was tried in May last year and jailed for four years and nine months for the alleged rape of a woman on the night of the 2018 NRL grand final.
The two-time Dally M winner has completed a six-year ordeal in connection with the case, including three criminal trials, two appeals and two prison sentences.
He was granted bail on Wednesday afternoon and his lawyer Lauren MacDougall said: ‘He’s really looking forward to getting home to his family.’
But the prospect of a fourth trial still looms for Hayne as he awaits his next court date.
Jarryd Hayne saw his rape conviction overturned on Wednesday
Prosecutors need time to consider holding a fourth trial before returning to court on July 26. MacDougall declined to comment on the prospect of a new trial as she left court with her client on Wednesday.
“Any decision on a possible retrial will be made in accordance with prosecutorial guidelines,” a spokeswoman for the Public Prosecution Service said in a statement.
The state’s highest court overturned Hayne’s convictions, ruling that the judge erred by not allowing further cross-examination of the complainant about her communications with third parties about the night of the alleged assault.
The appeals court found that the judge had failed to properly direct the jury regarding Hayne’s lawyers’ allegations that the complainant had lied about the contact, compounding the earlier error by not allowing her to respond to questions about it.
Hayne’s third plea, arguing that the now overturned guilty verdicts were unsafe or unreasonable, was not upheld, despite convincing one judge.
“I consider that there is a significant possibility that an innocent person has been convicted,” Judge Deborah Sweeney said in the court’s published reasons.
But she was overruled by judges Stephen Rothman and Anthony Meagher.
Judge Meagher did not support any of the grounds of the appeal.
“I am comfortable with the view that it was up to the jury to be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that (Hayne) was guilty,” he said.
Two-time Dally M winner Hayne was jailed last year but successfully appealed
The former NRL superstar could be tried for a fourth time
Hayne was accused of raping a woman with his hands and mouth at her Newcastle home on the night of the 2018 NRL Grand Final.
Three separate criminal trials were told that the woman, who cannot be identified, changed her mind about having sex with Hayne after realizing a taxi was waiting outside.
He was sentenced to four years and nine months in prison, but had already served part of that time before his earlier successful appeal.
Judge Rothman said there are good reasons not to conduct a fourth trial, noting it is unlikely to happen before Hayne’s three-year non-parole period expires in May 2025.
Judge Sweeney took a similar view given the history of the case.
“Trying Hayne a fourth time would not be in the interests of justice,” she said.
Hayne’s barrister, Tim Game SC, told the hearing in April that messages the woman sent to Hayne and others and deleted from her phone amounted to the deliberate concealment of evidence.
The ex-player’s defense team argued that the woman should have been cross-examined about why she allegedly told police: “If those reports get out, I’m fucked and he’ll go away.”
Judge Graham Turnbull, who oversaw Hayne’s third trial in the NSW District Court, refused requests to question the woman further, saying her expected answers, and eventual absence of them, would not create real unfairness.
But Judges Sweeney and Rothman ruled that Hayne’s lawyers should have questioned the complainant further and the jury left to consider her evidence and credibility.
Hayne’s overturned convictions followed a hung jury in his first trial in 2020 and an earlier appeal that overturned guilty verdicts from his second trial in 2021.
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National Sexual Abuse and Redressal Support Service 1800 211 028