The third of former tennis doubles
star Bob Hewitt’s alleged victims took the stand at the South Gauteng High
Court, sitting in Palm Ridge, on Wednesday.
The woman, whose identity is
protected, described the sexual abuse she allegedly faced at the hands of
Hewitt who was her tennis coach at the time. He gave her private tennis lessons
from age 14 to 17
“At a private lesson, he was quite
jovial… we were discussing tactics, and he said to me ‘rape is enjoyable in all
cases and if I rape you, you need to lie down and enjoy it’,” she told the
court.
“…By the time I got home he had
phoned my mother and told her he doesn’t think I have the mental toughness for
tennis.”
She added Hewitt often rubbed
against her inappropriately and would scold her if she moved away.
“I would try to pull away from
him, he would get angry. I could feel him rubbing himself up and down behind
me.
“I could feel something hard on my
back, which I assume, now as an adult, was an erection.”
Hewitt, a former tennis doubles
Grand Slam champion, faces two charges of rape and one of indecent assault. He
has pleaded not guilty and repeatedly denied all allegations. Other victims who had also accused him before
the court are Tolkem and Suellen Sheehan.
Tolken testified that Hewitt
forced her to perform oral sex on him when she was 12 and 13. She said he
touched her inappropriately and raped her at Sun City.
Sheehan said Hewitt raped her in
his car under some trees before tennis practice in Boksburg one day in 1982,
when she was 12.
