Accused man called alleged victim ‘thing’

One of two men on trial over the sexual assault and manslaughter of Lynette Daley called her a “thing” and asked a stranger to drop her down the road just hours before she died, a NSW jury has been told.

On Australia Day in 2011, retiree Brian Newton was parked outside an Iluka supermarket next to a four-wheel drive in which a woman was sitting between two men in the front.

“She looked very, very intoxicated,” Mr Newton told the NSW Supreme Court in Coffs Harbour on Wednesday.

The male passenger called him over and asked: “Can you drop this thing down the road for us, please?”

“He was obviously referring to the lady in between them,” Mr Newton told the jury.

“He had nothing else there, it was just the three of them.”

Ms Daley, 33, allegedly bled to death at Ten Mile Beach after she was sexually assaulted by her boyfriend, Adrian Attwater, and his mate Paul Maris.

Attwater, 42, has pleaded not guilty to manslaughter and aggravated sexual assault in company.
Maris, 47, has pleaded not guilty to aggravated sexual assault in company and hindering the discovery of evidence.

Foodworks supermarket employee Karen Collett said she saw a “scruffy” man thrusting against an Aboriginal woman in the biscuit aisle on Australia Day in 2011

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”He was actually standing behind her doing sexual references – pushing himself against her,” she told the court.

The pair appeared intoxicated and she watched them leave the shop because she “hoped they weren’t driving”.

They walked over to the back of a four-wheel drive where the man pulled the woman’s pants down to her knees, Ms Collett said.

The woman pulled her pants back up but “then he did it again”.
”Then she turned around and yelled out ‘Did anyone want a piece of this?'” Ms Collett said.

Peter Gallagher, an acquaintance of the two accused men, said he bumped into the trio outside the supermarket.

Attwater told him they were “going up the beach camping, fishing and getting pissed”, he said.

Mr Gallagher said Ms Daley, who was wearing a bra and a pair of pants, appeared intoxicated.

“(Her) eyes were glazed, head was nodding, eyes a little bit shut, she had a bit of a giggle every so often,” he said.

Attwater told him they planned on sleeping in the back of the troop carrier during the camping trip.

“I said ‘What, the three of you?'” Mr Gallagher told the court.

“He said, ‘Yeah, she’s a trooper’.

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Attwater then patted Ms Daley on the leg and winked at him, Mr Gallagher said.

The witness told the jury he was invited to the beach for a drink with the trio but his partner told him: “You’re not going up because there’s always trouble.”

The trial continues.