Woman gives tearful evidence about the alleged attack at Sydney’s Shangri-La hotel

A Chinese film star laughed and slapped a Sydney woman as a male producer raped her in a luxury hotel room, a jury has heard.

The woman gave tearful evidence on Wednesday about the alleged March 2018 attack by the TV and film star Yunxiang Gao and the Chinese producer Jing Wang.

Both men aged 37 have pleaded not guilty to all charges, including rape and indecent assault, with their barristers telling the New South Wales district court jury that all of the acts were consensual.

The Chinese woman says during the attack she was forced to perform a sex act on Wang, who was lying on the bed in his room at Sydney’s Shangri-La hotel.

Sydney woman said 'no, no, no' as she was raped by Chinese actor Yunxiang Gao, jury told Read more

At that time, Gao asked her if she was going to finish before the sun came out, and laughed at her, she said.

“He slapped on my bum a few times,” the complainant told the jury.

She said Gao left the room soon after as Wang began raping her again.

CCTV footage shows Gao leaving the room at 3.07am – about an hour before the woman left.

The woman told police about the alleged indecent assaults later that day but it wasn’t until the following day that she alleged she’d been raped.

She said she was scared and in shock during the first police interview.

“(In China) no woman would report this kind of thing to the police and because they are famous people, they got power, they are wealthy,” she told the jury.

The woman, who can’t be identified for legal reasons, worked as a crew member with Gao and Wang on Australian-shot episodes of the Chinese TV series Love in Aranya.

She told the court Wang repeatedly tried to kiss her during a wrap party and outside the hotel before telling her people from the production were going to meet in his room.

No one was there when she arrived, but she said she felt a bit safer when Gao arrived minutes later.

“He is always very polite and is a public figure and he got married and he has a daughter and is someone I can trust,” she said.

Told Gao wanted to chat, the woman asked him what he wanted to talk about.

“He said: ‘What chat do you think we’re going to have?’”

She responded that she didn’t know before she heard Wang walk to the bathroom and say words to the effect of “I’ll leave (her) to you”, she said.

Gao began kissing and undressing her before he pulled her to the bathroom and forced her to perform a sex act on him, she said.

She told the jury she said “no” on several occasions during the 90 minutes inside the hotel room.

“I was so scared in a horrible room ... I didn’t know what to do.”

Under cross-examination, Gao’s barrister, Murugan Thangaraj SC, suggested she told Australian crew members a different story about the morning of 27 March, including that Gao and Wang were drunk and needed to be taken back to the hotel.

“I can’t remember,” she said. “I never tell lies.”

The trial before Judge Penelope Hock continues.