http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/09/22/1064082919250.html

Sex, lies and churchgoers' secrets: court told of cop's con

September 22, 2003 - 5:08PM

A policeman conned a group of churchgoers into performing bizarre sexually titillating acts by pretending to enlist them as undercover agents to help him expose a paedophile ring, a Brisbane court was told today.

"These are the stories Enid Blyton would have written for the adult sleaze market," prosecutor Ron Swanwick said of the allegations of sexual perversion against James Arthur Marriner that spanned nearly 20 years.

"Instead of lemonade and lashings of ginger beer in the shed at the bottom of the garden, it's sleaze and porn and sexual assault at the den at the bottom of his house."

Marriner, 43, a former police sergeant based at Ipswich, west of Brisbane, was also a Sunday school teacher with the ultra-conservative Christian Brethren.

Mr Swanwick said the victims, aged from 12 into their early twenties, had been innocent and wide-eyed, and had trusted Marriner without question.

"He occupied a position below God, but certainly on par with the angels," he said.

Mr Swanwick said Marriner appeared to be in a stage of arrested childhood development, and played out an elaborate sham of Blytonesque secret adventures, recruiting people for supposedly covert police work against a gang of notorious paedophiles who had contacts with police and judiciary.

Marriner's recruiting procedures allegedly involved taking naked photos of the victims, and samples of their pubic hair, blood, and urine, and getting them to fill out detailed questionnaires that canvassed their sex lives.

Marriner allegedly told a woman who had sustained a needle stick injury that she had contracted a sexually transmitted disease and needed tests, which included her having to masturbate so that a vaginal swab could be taken when she climaxed.

The court was told Marriner videotaped this, telling the woman it had to be shown to the hierarchy at police headquarters to demonstrate that it had been done properly.

He also allegedly rubbed a special antidote cream over another woman's body.

Marriner has been charged with four counts of false pretences, three of assault causing bodily harm, one of misappropriation, two of attempted extortion, four of common assault, four of fraud, three of aggravated indecent assault, and one of indecent assault, from the 1980s until 2001.

He has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

The trial, in the District Court in Brisbane, is expected to take two weeks.

AAP