Where a child complainant's evidence contains elements that are inherently unbelievable and those elements are fundamental to the narrative of the offending, the removal of those elements may establish reasonable doubt as to the entire account, warranting appellate intervention notwithstanding the jury's advantage in seeing and hearing the witness. Crown submissions explaining away unreliable aspects of a complainant's evidence by reference to psychological phenomena such as dissociative states or manipulative behaviour of sexual abusers require expert evidence and cannot be based on counsel's speculation.
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