Major update on bucks party gang rape trial as jury finishes deliberations

WARNING: Graphic details

Three men will have to wait to learn their fate after they were found guilty of gang raping three teenagers during a bucks party weekend.

Andrew David, 30, and brothers Maurice Hawell, 30, and Marius Hawell, 22, stood trial in the NSW District Court this year after pleading not guilty to sexual assault offences.

The trio were accused of raping three teenagers at an Airbnb in February 2022 while they were staying in Newcastle to celebrate a bucks party for groom-to-be Maurice.

Prosecutors claimed the men sexually assaulted two 18-year-old women on the Friday night before attacking a 19-year-old woman on the following night.

Maurice and Andrew maintained that all sexual activity was consensual, while Marius claimed he did not participate in any of the sexual incidents during the bucks weekend.

The jury of eight men and four women deliberated for 8½ hours before returning unanimous guilty verdicts for nine of the 11 charges on Monday.

However, they were unable to reach a unanimous verdict on two counts and were instructed to continue discussions.

At lunchtime on Tuesday, the jurors found Maurice was guilty of sexually touching an 18-year-old without her consent on the previous night.

The teen told the court Maurice had tried to sexually touch her upper thigh, near her groin, while she was lying in bed after consensual sex with another bucks party attendee.

“I don’t, like, want that,” she recalled telling the groom-to-be.

The jury also told the court they were unable to reach a unanimous decision about whether the Hawell brothers and Andrew had anally raped the same 18-year-old woman that night.

The teen said she was held down on a bed in a dark bedroom and stripped naked by a “swarm” of men.

She described trying to bat away a man’s penis as he tried to put it in her mouth, while another man tried to place her free hand on his penis.

The 18-year-old said she was then vaginally and anally raped, but she was unable to identify her attackers because the room was so dark.

Although the teen could not identify her assailants, the jury on Monday found the Hawell brothers and Andrew had sexually assaulted the woman in the dark room.

However, the jurors could not agree on whether the three men were guilty of anal rape.

Judge Gina O’Rourke instructed the jurors to try to reach a majority decision on the charge of aggravated sexual assault in company against the trio.

After just over an hour of consideration, the jury said they were unable to come to an agreement.

Judge O’Rourke formally discharged the jury in relation to their obligations to provide a verdict on final allegations against the three men.

The three rapists sat in the dock wearing prison-issued green tracksuits and blank expressions.

They will return to the NSW District Court to be sentenced in September.

Maurice has already asked his legal team to appeal the verdicts, his lawyer James Clements told NewsWire.

On Monday, the jury found the trio were guilty of gang raping three teenagers over two consecutive nights of a bucks party weekend.

The 18-year-old women told the court they had been sexually assaulted on the Friday night when they went to retrieve their phones as they prepared to leave the Airbnb.

They said they were both thrown back into beds and pinned down as the men gang raped them in a dark room, leaving them unable to move or identify their attackers. 

The jury also found Maurice, Andrew, and Marius had gang raped a third teen on the following night after Maurice lured her into the rented Airbnb using a fake name.

The court heard he persuaded the woman to come up to his apartment for pre-drinks, but instead ushered her into a bedroom.

Maurice pushed her onto a bed and they kissed before he asked if she wanted to have a threesome with him and Andrew.

“What? No,” she told him.

Despite her refusal, the teen said Mr David pinned her to the bed by kneeling on her shoulders before he forced his penis into her mouth while Maurice raped her.

The jury accepted Marius entered the room and used his phone’s flashlight as the men took turns sexually assaulting the 19-year-old.

The court heard the teen put her pants on backwards in her haste to leave the apartment after the gang rape and she was “sobbing”.

Sexual assault support lines embed