A WOMAN who had sex with a takeaway food delivery driver under the misapprehension she was with her husband says a jury's guilty verdict has restored her right to sleep in her own bed.
Amit Hamal, 22, a Nepalese national, was delivering Indian food to the woman's house when he walked past her bedroom, noticed she was alseep and proceded to remove her pants and have sexual intercourse.
Her husband, who had fallen asleep in the lounge while waiting for the food to arrive, denied having sex with her when she raised it the following morning, saying it must have been a vivid dream.
It was not until Hamal called the house later that day and suggested they become casual sex partners that she realised she had been sexually assaulted.
During a trial in the District Court, Hamal told the jury the sex was consensual, claiming the woman initiated the encounter by pulling him towards her.
However, on June 29, the jury found Hamal guilty of sexual intercourse without consent.
Yesterday, in a victim impact statement read to the court, the woman said: 'Having the panel of jurors reach a guilty verdict has given me back my rights as a human being and most importantly my rights as a woman who slept innocently in her own bed, in her own home.'
Hamal's barrister, Charles Waterstreet, said Hamal had grown up in a 'repressed society' and the availability of casual sex in Western society 'was quite an eye opener' when he arrived in Australia in 2009.
'It was a crime of opportunity and impulse,' Mr Waterhouse said. 'It was a mutual act, albeit under misapprehension.'
Hamal found the front door open when he arrived at the Rose Bay house about 9.15pm on July 16, 2010, more than two hours after the order was placed. 'Stepping inside the bedroom may have been a bit too far,' Mr Waterhouse said.
However, the Crown Prosecutor, Michael O'Brien, said Hamal had tried to wake the woman's husband, and when he couldn't, took advantage of the situation he had walked into.
That he was arrested two days later at the airport in possession of a one-way ticket to Kathmandu showed he knew his actions were wrong.
Hamal will be sentenced on August 31.