‘A bunch of you put her up to this’ Bush tells prosecutor

(CNS): As his trial continued Thursday, McKeeva Bush MP emphatically and persistently denied a historical sexual assault allegation when he took the stand to give evidence in his own defence. In an often combative and angry exchange with prosecutor Eloise Marshall KC during cross-examination, Bush repeatedly said that the incident, as described by the woman, never happened and that he does not know her, although he now knows of her.

He accused the UK authorities of conspiring against him because of his legacy as a politician and his battles with the English and their representatives here.

Bush said that the director of public prosecutions was constantly after him. “I believe a bunch of you put her up to this,” he told the lawyer representing the crown in this case and suggested that his accuser was a “sick woman”. He said she had been used by the previous governor and police commissioner, as well as the DPP, to target him.

The former premier repeatedly stated that he had never been in a vehicle with the woman who has accused him of raping her down a dark side road in a mangrove clearing off the West Bay Road one night sometime in the year 2000.

However, during Bush’s evidence, the court heard that when he was first spoken to by the police about the allegation, he was told it could have been between 1999 and 2003. During the course of the trial the crown has focused on the year 2000, while the accuser had stated that it could have been in 1999.

Although no firm time for when the rape allegedly occurred has been established, Bush stated numerous times that he had rarely been to the bar in question and would not have attended around the year 2000. He said it was very unlikely he would have been at the Sea Inn, which is in the heart of George Town Central, because that was an area known then as being in the territory of Kurt Tibbetts, one of the founders of the PPM, and Bush, a West Bay MP, said that George Town was not his “stomping ground”.

When Marshall asked Bush if it was possible that this incident happened but he had simply forgotten about it, he stated, “No, I am very clear… It never happened.” He said it was a “deliberate and absolute lie”.

He repeatedly stated in response to the prosecutor’s questions about whether he had ever been to the Sea Inn bar during the potential time of the alleged rape that he had not been there in 1999 or 2000. “No. I can’t say more than that… I was never anywhere with her,” he said, referring to the complainant. He went on to say that he had never been driven home from that bar by anyone.

Bush also told the court that he had never had sex with anyone at the side of the road, and throughout his time in the witness box, he said many times that he had never been anywhere with the complaint, that she had never been inside any of his vehicles and that she had never been to his home. He also disputed the allegation that he had been driving a Ford Expedition. He said he never owned that type of vehicle, and around that time he had a Lincoln Town Car.

During the course of her cross-examination, Marshall challenged Bush several times over why he had not answered certain questions put to him by the police during his original interview in 2023, suggesting that he was hedging against what might happen if he was caught in a lie. But Bush questioned why he should answer at all when it was untrue. He said he had no reason to answer, especially because he did not trust the police and some of them “could barely even take notes”.

He stated that he had never lied to his country and said he could talk all day about the good he had done. This included helping Cayman’s economy enough “to pay you”, he told the lawyer.

Bush said he had told the police at the beginning of the interview that he did not know the woman and that the incident had never occurred, and his lawyer had advised him to say no more than that.

Asked about whether he knew the woman’s family, he explained how it was that he knew her brother (which cannot be detailed here for legal reasons) and said he knew of the mother and the complainant through notoriety.

However, Bush claimed he had learned that on an occasion several years ago, the complainant had stopped him on the parliament steps and berated him over the infamous status grants and threatened to run him from office. He said that at the time he had no idea who she was, but shortly afterwards, someone who had seen that incident had told him the name of the woman, which was that of the complainant.

When the woman had given her evidence in court, she said that she had been interested in running for office and had met with Roy McTaggart (the current PPM Leader) to ask him about the possibility of running on the PPM ticket if she ever decided to do this.

Bush also stated that he knew of the complainant through reputation because she had been a teenage mother and her children all had different fathers. Asked by the prosecutor why that was relevant, Bush blamed the lawyer for asking him about knowing the woman.

He said that his own mother, who was a single parent, had brought him up to know that there are “certain people you don’t mix with”, at which point his own attorney intervened and suggested the court take a short break.

When the proceedings resumed, Bush continued to deny the allegations as Marshall suggested he had raped and sexually abused the woman and asked if he had had oral sex with her, to which Bush replied, “No!” adding that “that is the worst thing in the world”.

When he was asked about how she was clearly traumatised by the rape, he accused the woman of theatrics and persisted in his denials. Marshall suggested that Bush himself was engaged in theatrics and performing for the jury to curry favour.

However, his claims about his lifelong “good works”, as well as his allegations about the DPP and other authorities, allowed the prosecutor to question him about his previous conviction for violence against a woman.

Bush implied that that assault, to which he had pleaded guilty, happened because he had pulled on the victim’s blouse as he tried to retrieve his phone from her during an altercation in a beach bar owned by his son. He said he had accepted that this was considered assault, so he had pleaded guilty. But he claimed the dispute was over the bar manager’s failure to properly distribute gratuities and played down the violent incident.

His claims were a distortion of the facts that were established by the court when Bush was convicted and sentenced in December 2020.

Marshall pointed out to him that he was drunk and slumped on the ground when the victim in that case had tried to assist him, but he had reacted violently. Bush responded that he did not “beat any woman” and claimed that the former DPP had been “run out of office for racism”.

When Marshall continued to drill Bush over the rape and sexual assault in this case, Bush continued with his emphatic denials that the incident simply had not happened. He said that the woman was telling lies, and told the prosecutor they were lies that “you are perpetuating”.

The case continues.

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