A Dunedin jury yesterday found a 20-year-old Dunedin student accused of rape not guilty, after deliberating for five and a-half hours.
The jury returned its verdict of not guilty on three sexual violation charges at 6.30pm, following a five-day trial in the Dunedin District Court.
The man, who has interim name suppression, faced the allegations following an incident in the basement of a Dundas St flat during a party there on May 9 last year.
The complainant alleged she had not consented to sexual activity that occurred in the basement that night.
The man's defence was he believed she was consenting.
Earlier yesterday Judge Paul Kellar summed up the case.
He told the jury it was for them alone to decide whether the man reasonably believed the sexual activity between him and the complainant was consensual.
To convict him they had to be convinced beyond reasonable doubt that the man could not have believed the woman was consenting and that no reasonable person, in his shoes, could have thought she was, the judge told the jury.
He then talked about several points of evidence, before the jury retired to deliberate its verdict.
