A decades-old sexual assault case has opened at the Downing Centre District Court in New South Wales, Australia, where 56-year-old former police officer David Robert Blackbourne faces multiple criminal charges over the alleged abuse of a 17-year-old girl at a rural border police station in 1998. Blackbourne has entered a plea of not guilty to all five counts before the court: two counts of indecent assault, two counts of non-consensual sexual intercourse, and one count of public office misconduct.
During the first week of the trial, the now-adult complainant, who cannot be named publicly under Australian law to protect her identity, took the witness stand to recount the sequence of events that she says unfolded in the months leading up to the alleged October 1998 assault. The woman, who was under the age of majority at the time, told the jury she first encountered Blackbourne, who she only knew by the first name Dave, on multiple occasions when she was a teenager living in the small rural town on the New South Wales-Victoria border.
The first alarming interaction she detailed occurred months before the alleged rape, when Blackbourne and an unidentified second officer offered the teenager and her friend a ride home. The pair agreed, but were driven first to the local police station. At the station, the officers offered the underage girls alcoholic drinks they claimed were seized contraband, before the complainant was invited to view the holding cells out of curiosity. “I said yes, I was curious,” she told the court. When she stepped inside the large brick cell, Blackbourne locked the door behind her, leaving her trapped alone in the cold, dark, damp space for far longer than she expected. “I got quite panicked, like I couldn’t get out it was cold and dark,” she testified.
In the months that followed, the complainant alleged Blackbourne leveraged his position of authority to ingratiate himself to her, saying he offered to ensure she could enter local pubs despite being underage. On one night walk, Blackbourne pulled over in his marked police vehicle, and the girl and her friend got inside. She told the jury that Blackbourne immediately handcuffed both of her wrists, then kissed her against her will, forcing his tongue into her mouth.
The final, violent assault occurred in October 1998 when the teenager visited the police station to pick up a police hat she had arranged to borrow for a friend’s costume. After handing over the hat, Blackbourne told her she could not leave yet. The woman told the court Blackbourne suddenly became intimidating and angry, leaving her terrified that she was in trouble for taking the hat. He then kissed her again without consent, pulled down her pants, and raped her behind the police station’s front counter before forcing her into a separate room and assaulting her a second time.
Breaking down in tears while staring directly at Blackbourne in the dock, the complainant recounted the aftermath of the assault. “Afterwards … he handed me some tissues and he told [me] to clean myself up,” she said. She walked home sobbing, and stopped halfway on a local bridge, where she contemplated ending her life. “I was very upset and overwhelmed by what happened … and I was contemplating jumping off the bridge,” she said.
The woman told the court she kept the alleged abuse secret for four years, only disclosing the incident to her now-husband during a trip to Europe in 2002. She did not report the allegations to police until 2016, when she spoke to officers in Victoria, before the investigation was transferred to New South Wales Police in November 2021. Blackbourne was arrested and formally charged in 2023, more than 25 years after the alleged incident.
In his opening statement to the jury, Blackbourne’s defence barrister Matthew Johnston SC said the former officer strongly denies every allegation. The defence does not dispute that Blackbourne was a serving officer at the time of the alleged events, but rejects all claims of sexual contact and misconduct. Johnston noted to the jury that the passage of more than two decades means the reliability and quality of the evidence presented will be a key point of contention throughout the trial.
Presiding Judge Huw Baker SC reminded the jury of its legal obligation to the standard of proof: the prosecution carries the burden of proving all allegations against Blackbourne beyond a reasonable doubt. The trial is expected to continue in coming weeks as more evidence is presented to the jury.