West Australian MP James Hayward sent an email to his wife admitting child abuse before he was charged, his trial has been told.

August 21, 2023

A West Australian MP on trial for child sexual abuse admitted the crimes in an email to his wife before he was charged, a court has been told.

James Dorrin Hayward has pleaded not guilty to four offences relating to the alleged abuse of an eight-year-old girl.

Prosecutor Sean Stocks on Monday said the 53-year-old made the girl indecently touch him on three occasions while putting her to bed.

“He told police in an interview that he had fallen asleep on her bed,” Mr Stocks told the District Court in Perth during his opening.

“He also told police he would get under the covers with (the child) while he was reading to her.”

Hayward is also accused of showing the child, who was six years old when the abuse allegedly started, how to search for pornography on the internet before her family discovered the alleged offences and reported them to police.

He allegedly told the girl to keep their interactions secret amid warnings from his wife not to get too close to the child for fear an allegation could be made against him.

Hayward resigned from the WA Nationals after the charges were laid in 2021 but continued to sit in the state’s upper house as an independent MP.

Mr Stocks said after he learned about the allegations against him, Hayward wrote a letter to his wife in which he said he would be accused of child abuse.

“He penned the first draft of what was ostensibly a suicide note,” Mr Stocks said.

Hayward allegedly sent the letter via email a week later, with an additional line.

“He added the phrase ‘which I have done’ with a sad face emoji,” Mr Stocks said.

Hayward’s lawyer Tom Percy KC said Hayward’s email was “foolish in the extreme” and a “misguided gesture” written during a stressful time in his life and not an admission of guilt.

He said it was an irrational decision that contained no reference to the substance of the allegations and instead addressed his wife’s warning.

“He was at the time under an enormous amount of financial and business pressure,” he said.

“He was in a complete state of shock on hearing of these sexual allegations, not because they were true but quite the opposite.”

Mr Percy said Hayward’s former business had recently failed and he owed about $440,000 and he was aware of the publicity the abuse allegations would attract.

“Coupled with the ongoing financial disaster surrounding him, he felt he just didn’t have the strength to deal with those consequences,” he said.

He said Hayward believed suicide would protect his and the victim’s families.

Mr Percy told the jury the child’s family learned about the alleged abuse after she was found accessing pornography on the internet and “she knew in all probability she would lose the use of her iPad”.

“She needed a scapegoat and she needed one quickly and under pressure, we say, she nominated James,” he said.

“It is almost certain she had no idea of the enormity of the allegations she was making.”

He said there was no medical or other physical evidence that showed his client was guilty of the crimes. But there was “serious doubt over the child’s honesty”.

Two videos of the child being interviewed about the allegations were shown to the court, in which she said she was sure the abuse happened but could not answer many of the questions put to her.

“He put my hand into his knickers,” she said in one of the recordings.

Asked how many times the alleged abuse occurred, she said: “I don’t know … I’m pretty sure it was more than once”.

She later said she could only recall two instances when Hayward allegedly made her touch him.

The court heard the girl’s iPad history showed she had accessed pornography websites 140 times.

She said Hayward showed her how to do the searches.