A sports coach accused of indecently assaulting a teenage girl he trained in the 1970s has denied all charges against him and told a jury: "Had I been guilty I would not put my family and friends through this."
The 58-year-old man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the jury on day three of the trial that the allegations had destroyed his life, destroyed him financially and destroyed the sport he had loved and cared for.
He denies 30 counts of indecently assaulting a now 43- year- old woman at a Dublin school between June 1976 and January 1979 when she was aged between 14 and 16. "There are two people in court, me and her, who know that this did not happen," he told the jury.
Judge Yvonne Murphy told the jury she would direct it to find the accused not guilty of eight of the counts before them.
Giving evidence in his own defence, he told his senior counsel Feargal Kavanagh that until a complaint was made against him, he had considered his accuser to be a friend.
He agreed with barrister Tony Hunt, prosecuting, that he had formed a close friendship with the woman some years after she left school after meeting her in a pub and that they would meet for dinner and drinks until sometime in the mid 1980s when he said their friendship "began to drift".
Another woman who had been coached by the accused man since she was nine told the court she never had any doubts about him and was horrified and surprised by the allegations.
The trial continues before Judge Murphy and a jury at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.