Babysitter Kevin Malone accused of sexually abusing girl as she played Xbox at his home

Kevin Patrick Malone, 47, was "like a father figure" to the alleged victim, Crown prosecutor Skye Jerome told the ACT Supreme Court on Monday afternoon.

Ms Jerome said that during her opening address in the trial of Malone, who has pleaded not guilty to two charges alleging he engaged in sexual intercourse with a child on unknown dates between December 2011 and December 2014.

The prosecutor told 14 jurors that after the death of the alleged victim's sister, Malone lent her "struggling" mother money with which to go out and socialise.

While the woman was out, Ms Jerome said, Malone would babysit the alleged victim at his Canberra home.

The girl would sometimes stay overnight and sleep on a mattress with Malone in the accused's loungeroom, the prosecutor told the court.

Ms Jerome told the jury the alleged victim recalled about four occasions of sexual abuse, which occurred when she was seven or eight years old.

Two of these, the court heard, formed the basis of the charges Malone has denied.

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The jury heard one of the alleged incidents occurred while the girl was on the mattress, playing one of her favourite video games on Malone's Xbox.

Ms Jerome said the girl recalled grabbing Malone's hands and pulling them out of her pants after he penetrated her, "but he put them back in".

The other alleged incident was said to have occurred after the girl drank a glass of lemonade, given to her by Malone, and became very sleepy.

Ms Jerome said the girl had "passed out" on the mattress, but not before feeling the accused penetrating her.

The prosecutor told jurors the girl had woken up in pain after an unusually long sleep, and told Malone "you shouldn't have been in the same bed as me".

"[Malone] replied, 'Why? It isn't a big deal'," Ms Jerome said.

The prosecutor said the girl's mother, who remembered thinking the child had "been drugged", never left her alone with Malone overnight again after this.

She added that the girl had disclosed the alleged abuse to her mother around Mother's Day in 2017, before feeling "compelled" to tell police in September 2020 after learning another child was spending time at Malone's house.

Defence barrister Margaret Jones SC told the jury Malone rejected claims of "any sort of drugging", and "absolutely denied" the sexual abuse allegations.

She said there was no issue that Malone had been close with the alleged victim's mother, or that he had "helped [her] out" with babysitting.

But Ms Jones indicated there would be a dispute over claims Malone had encouraged the mother to go out, saying she expected the evidence to show the woman had left the girl with the accused in order to drink and gamble.

The defence barrister added that Malone had told police he and the alleged victim's mother had stopped speaking after "a big falling out", which had occurred as a result of them arguing about the death of her other daughter.

She also said the credibility and reliability of the alleged victim, who grew up in an environment with "very few boundaries", was "very much in issue".

Ms Jones finished by urging jurors not to pre-judge the case and to leave any prejudices or emotion out of their deliberations, acknowledging that the community understandably "abhorred" child sex offences.

The court was closed to the public after opening addresses as the jury, comprised of 10 men and four women, watched pre-recorded evidence.

Justice Chrissa Loukas-Karlsson has told jurors the trial is expected to last three or four days.

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