Woman 'knew' lover was female 'from the start'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-34209710

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A woman who accused a friend of pretending to be a man in order to have sex with her knew all along she was female, a court heard.

Defendant Gayle Newland, 25, told Chester Crown Court she was not ready for sex but the complainant persuaded her to buy a prosthetic penis.

She admitted creating fake male online accounts to speak to girls, using photos of an American man.

Ms Newland, from Willaston, Cheshire, denies five sexual assaults in 2013.

She claims the complainant knew Ms Newland was a woman from the "get-go" having first met on a night out in 2011, after which the complainant added the fake Facebook account - in the name of Kye Fortune - as a friend.

"My main reason why I spoke as Kye was for her," Ms Newland told the court, adding: "If she wanted to hide her sexuality I would allow her to do that."

The pair continued to communicate by phone but the defendant denied changing her voice during their chats.

The relationship then developed as "a combination" of "role play" and "sexual fantasy" even after the pair met as themselves after being "introduced" by "Kye", Ms Newland claimed.

But she insisted "at no stage" was the claimant blindfolded between February and June 2013 when the sexual assaults were alleged to have occurred.

Ms Newland said she "didn't really know what the hell I was doing" when she later used the prosthetic penis on one of her regular visits to the complainant's flat.

The court heard shortly before they last had sex Newland told the complainant she was telling her parents she was gay and the relationship ended soon after.

Later Ms Newland sent her a text message saying: "I am sorry I said lies to hide lies but I did not lie about everything. It was me and still is."

Asked to explain, she told the jury: "Again, it sounds ridiculous, I don't really know why I thought it but a part of me did believe that she didn't know."

She told Matthew Corbett-Jones, for the prosecution, she did not know why her lover had gone to the police.

'Believed you were a man'

Mr Corbett-Jones said: "She says the reason she came forward was to stop you doing it to someone else."

Ms Newland replied: "I don't see how that is a reason."

The prosecutor said: "She believed you were a man."

Ms Newland said: "Why would she believe that? She is an intelligent young woman, very very intelligent."

Mr Corbett-Jones replied: "Because you told her. You told her repeatedly over a period of two years."

Ms Newland said: "So she wore a blindfold the complete time. Really? Really? Is that what people do because I have not heard of that?

"And don't get me wrong, I'm not the most normal of people but I have never heard of that."

The trial continues.