Sri Lankan cricketer Danushka Gunathilaka allegedly told a Tinder date not to worry and not to get pregnant before he secretly removed a condom during sex.
The 32-year-old cricketer made a match with the woman on the dating app on October 29, 2022 and met her for the first time four days later at the Opera Bar in Sydney.
The couple later returned to the woman’s home in the eastern suburbs, where he is accused of raping her through “stealthing” – removing a condom during sexual intercourse without the other person’s knowledge.
Gunathilaka pleaded not guilty to one count of sexual intercourse without consent.
The woman, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, said he kissed her forcefully and slapped her buttocks on the way home that night, then choked her two or three times during sex.
“I remember trying to remove his hand from my throat,” she said on Monday as the trial began in the New South Wales District Court.
“At that point I was afraid for my life.”
The court found that other than the alleged stealth incident, there was no indication that the sexual activity that occurred that night was non-consensual.
Crown prosecutor Gabrielle Steedman said just because someone consented to one type of activity did not mean they also consented to others.
In her statement, the woman alleged that Gunathilaka was adamant that he did not want to wear the condom despite her insistence.
He allegedly told her not to worry, adding: “I’m not going to get you pregnant, darling.”
The woman said Gunathilaka told her that night, “Don’t you trust me? You should trust me.”
Steedman told Judge Sarah Huggett the woman noticed the used condom on the floor just seconds after he stopped having sex with her.
“The complainant states that she was completely shocked by what happened,” the prosecutor said.
The alleged removal of the condom and his other behavior during the night showed the cricketer did not care about or respect the woman’s wishes, Steedman said.
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In an interview with police shortly after his arrest at the Hyatt Regency Hotel on November 6, Gunathilaka denied removing the condom and said he put on a second one because the first one was “not good.”
When police searched the woman’s apartment, only one condom was found, which contained DNA profiles that matched both him and the alleged victim.
Gunathilaka’s lawyer, Murugan Thangaraj SC, said there were questions about whether the complainant was a credible witness.
When she first spoke to her friends and then to a doctor shortly after the alleged incident, she did not mention the condom that had allegedly been removed, he said.
The detail was only mentioned when she spoke to police on November 5, the court heard.
In his police questioning, Gunathilaka categorically denied removing the condom, Thangaraj said.
“Since it was the first time the two had sex, he also wanted to wear a condom,” he said.
The single judge trial continues.
