Outback WA pub worker accuses manager of raping her after staff drinks

A British backpacker who was working at an outback pub in Western Australia’s north-west alleges a former manager raped her after a night of doing cocaine in the pub’s toilets.

Stewart Patrick Burchell is on trial in WA’s District Court, sitting in the tourist town of Broome, over allegations made against him while he managed the Roebuck Bay Hotel.

Burchell has pleaded not guilty to all 16 charges against him, which include 15 counts of indecent assault and one count of rape.

The court has heard from four complainants in the case, including a woman who worked as a “skimpy” bartender when Burchell allegedly inappropriately touched her, with six women due to give evidence in the trial.

On Wednesday afternoon, the court heard from the fourth complainant in the trial, who gave evidence via video link from London.

The woman told the court she was attempting to complete her 88 days work on her 417 holiday visa to stay in Australia for an extra year when Burchell offered her a job and allegedly offered to forge her payslips for her.

She said Burchell said he had “done it before”, and offered to list her role on her payslip as a construction worker, rather than as a bartender, to help her stay in Australia.

A 417 visa is contingent on a person spending time working in some of Australia’s key sectors including farming and construction.

The woman told the court she had joined Burchell and her colleagues for staff drinks one evening in early 2020 when he offered her cocaine and the pair snuck into the pub’s toilets.

After returning home for the evening, the woman said she received texts and a phone call from Burchell asking her to “keep the party going”, before he turned up at the address she was house-sitting and banged on the front door.

The woman told the court she ignored him, but became nervous neighbours could hear and let him in.

She said he went upstairs and tried to light a cigarette before attempting to kiss her.

“He was already saying, ‘You’re a sex addict like me, there’s a darkness in you, I know you want me, you’re the one who got me here, you’ve seduced me, you wanted this’,” the woman told the court.

The woman said she said “no” a number of times before Burchell pulled her onto the bed and allegedly responded with, “you mean yes”.

She alleged he then raped her before leaving the home.

The woman told the court there were two other incidents involving Burchell following the alleged rape, and said she felt she could not leave the hotel’s employment due to her visa complications.

“I needed the payslips to be able to stay,” she said.

“I didn’t think I had any options and I wanted him to forge the payslips.”

She told the court that despite her becoming cold and sarcastic when she had to be around him, Burchell made her drive him home from the pub in the hotel’s courtesy bus days after the alleged rape and groped her while she was driving.

In another incident, Burchell allegedly cornered her in the sports bar of the hotel and again offered her cocaine before pulling her top off her, and attempting to kiss her again.

During cross-examination, defence lawyer Alexander Mossop argued the pair had engaged in consensual sex, and there were instances when the woman had been “flirty” with Burchell.

“Do you remember telling him he smelled nice?” Mossop asked.

“No,” the woman replied.

Mossop presented a different series of events of the evening, and told the court the woman had taken Burchell to her home in her car, made the pair drinks and had consensual sex.

He further alleged the pair in fact had sex again the following evening.

Mossop told the court the woman had maintained a friendly attitude to Burchell after the alleged rape, and claimed the incidents on the courtesy bus and at the pub did not happen.

However, the woman rejected all the propositions put to her.

Also on Wednesday, another woman told the court she was a former employee of the Roebuck Bay Hotel and had a “stand-offish” relationship with Burchell when she attended the pub’s regular wet T-shirt competition in January 2020.

“[He wasn’t] always the nicest – he would make funny comments about my sexuality and about the people I was talking to and had relationships with,” she said.

She said she was approached by Burchell, who said she had the “best tits in Broome” and pulled her shirt down, exposing her breasts.

Another woman told the court she was working for Burchell when she was allegedly cornered in her staff accommodation following drinks with colleagues and threatened her with her job unless she performed a sex act in front of him.

He also allegedly pressured her to have sex with him, but she rebuffed him.

Mossop has previously alleged that woman conspired with the skimpy bartender to fabricate allegations against Burchell in a bid to sue the Roebuck Bay Hotel.

He told the court there were complex connections between each of the complainants, with two of the women entering into a relationship in 2020.

All women have strongly denied the allegations, and there is no legal action afoot against the Roebuck Bay Hotel.

The trial is set down for two weeks.

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