The Nancy Kissel Case - Part 39

(Reuters AlertNet)  Wife of murdered HK banker says she still loves him.  August 28, 2005.

An American woman who has admitted clubbing her wealthy banker husband to death declared in a Hong Kong court on Monday that she still loved him and was not trying to paint a negative picture of him.  Taking the witness stand in the High Court for a fifth day, Nancy Kissel said she had nevertheless been shocked to learn of the homosexual and bisexual leanings of her husband Robert when police investigators discovered after his death that he had visited such alternative Web sites using their home laptop.

"From his interests, he had a fascination with gay anal sex, prostitution ... something I was not aware of in our marriage," said Kissel, 41, who told the court last week that her husband had forcibly sodomised her for years and abused her physically.  "It put things in perspective ... why he did what he did with me ... I see his researching of gay anal sex and then he researched it for Taiwan when he travelled to Taiwan, Paris."  "It's quite shocking to find out he was somebody I didn't really know," she said on day two of her cross-examination.

Kissel said last week that because of stress from his job at Merrill Lynch, her husband often flew into cocaine- and alcohol-fuelled rages and was sometimes very rough with their three children.  But she declared on Monday that she still considered him her husband and still loved him.

"There were isolated times when he was very rough with the children, there were times when he would terrify me because I had no control of him," she said, breaking down in tears.  "I am not trying to paint a bad picture of him. I still love him. He was my husband," she said, sobbing so uncontrollably that the judge called for a brief recess to let her compose herself.

Kissel admitted last week she clubbed her husband to death with a metal statue on the night of Nov. 2, 2003, but she has made no change to her plea of not guilty to murder -- for which she is being charged.  She has also insisted she did not spike a milkshake she served her husband and a neighbour with antidepressants and hypnotic drugs just hours before she killed him.  If convicted of murder she could face life in jail.  Police found Robert Kissel's body four days after his death rolled up in a carpet in a storeroom in the luxury residential estate where they lived with their children.

It is not clear how the defence plans to argue her case. It could say she acted while temporarily insane, which would extend her some level of protection under "diminished responsibility", or that she acted in self-defence.

Prosecuting lawyer Peter Chapman said observations by the defendant's own lawyer and a psychiatrist who looked after Kissel when she was held in custody in Hong Kong between November 2003 and November 2004 suggested she had no psychiatric problems.  He also repeatedly questioned why she never told anyone of the abuses she said she suffered through the years.

Kissel said the expatriate life she led did not permit her to do so and she did everything to hide her unhappiness.  "It was something I was very ashamed of and am still ashamed of," she said. "I wore a lot of makeup, wore sunglasses, long-sleeves. I put on a good face so people wouldn't know what was happening in my life."

She told the court earlier she had become so depressed with her marriage she attempted suicide and had an affair with a TV repairman during an extended stay in the United States with the children to escape Hong Kong's SARS epidemic in 2003.  The Kissel case has shocked and riveted Hong Kong's expatriate community since the trial began in June. Wealthy, successful and popular, the Kissels were seen for years as having the best marriage in town.

The prosecution said earlier that Robert Kissel had decided to divorce his wife after discovering the affair and was going to tell her that on the night that he was slain.

The trial is expected to last until late August.

(The Standard)  I still love him, says Kissel.  August 9, 2005.

Despite earlier claims of intense physical and emotional abuse, a shaking and choking Nancy Kissel declared Monday that she still loves her husband Robert, who she is accused of murdering.

''I still love him,'' she said during cross-examination at the High Court.

''He was my husband.''

When prosecutor Peter Chapman began his questioning about her husband's alleged "abusive behavior'' towards their children, Kissel replied in her most emotional state yet: "I'm not trying to paint a bad picture of him, because I loved him and he was not a bad husband, and I still love him. He was my husband, he was my husband,'' she repeated.

At this point, Justice Michael Lunn suggested a short recess.

During cross-examination, the prosecution attempted to press home the point that Kissel did not tell her family or friends about the alleged history of sexual abuse she had suffered.  The prosecution also suggested that the accused had not mentioned her husband's alleged acts of sodomy and cocaine use when she spoke to doctors and counselors because "there was nothing to tell'' or "because it wasn't happening.''

Kissel's chief psychiatrist, Dr Henry Yuen - who had previously reported that the accused was mentally stable with no suicidal tendencies and who had made no mention of memory loss - was not granted permission by the defendant to testify at the trial.

Kissel, in her fifth day in the witness box, was subjected to another grilling about her alleged memory loss and her failure to make concrete reports to friends, family, doctors or the police during the five years she said she was abused.

Since the beginning of her testimony last week, the crowds have swelled to an extent that, Monday, two crowd-control marshals were employed to ensure no more than 10 people were standing in the courtroom. There was also a note saying those who left their seats might have to queue for re-entry into the courtroom.

In replying to the prosecution's questions, Kissel said her husband's confidante, Bryna O'Shea, would not listen to anything bad about him and that members of the expatriate community in Hong Kong did not like to hear about such issues.

"The alternative, Mrs Kissel, is that there was nothing to tell,'' said Peter Chapman, senior assistant director of public prosecutions.

When asked by Chapman to elaborate on her husband's "abusive behavior'' towards their children, the defendant said she only noted isolated incidents of violence.

She then said she still loved him.

Kissel is accused of serving her husband a pink milkshake laced with sedatives, which left him unconscious at the foot of the bed as she bludgeoned him to death with a heavy metal ornament on November 2, 2003.  His decomposing body was found wrapped in a rug in a locked storeroom at their Parkview residential complex in the early hours of November 7.

Kissel testified last week that she thought her husband was going to kill her on the night in question while they were having a furious argument about divorce and during which he attempted to have sex with her.  In resisting the sex, she knocked him on the head, which resulted in him swinging a baseball bat at her while repeatedly saying: "I'm going to kill you, you bitch.''  She later accepted that she had inflicted the fatal wounds, but said she could not remember further details about the fight or her consequent actions.

Chapman pointed out Monday that, during her bail application in November 2004, her instructing solicitor, her close friends and her chief psychiatrist, Dr Yuen, had made affirmations that they thought she did not suffer from any psychiatric illness.  Using the transcripts of that bail hearing, Chapman noted there was no suggestion by anyone that she suffered from memory loss.

He also quoted from her then-senior counsel, John Griffiths, who said: "She is visited monthly by a psychiatrist and there has been no suggestion by him that she is in need of any help."

"So, a person with dissociative amnesia doesn't need help?'' asked Chapman.  Kissel replied she was not in a position to comment on psychiatric terms.

"I suggest to you, Mrs Kissel, that the reason for that [not allowing Dr Yuen to testify], as disclosed in the transcript by your counsel, Mr Griffiths, is there is absolutely no psychiatric problem with you. Do you agree?'' asked Chapman.

"Yes,'' replied the accused, adding that the psychiatrist's report was given in the context of whether she was psychiatrically fit enough to be granted bail and that, indeed, she did not suffer from schizophrenia or any other disorder covered by the Mental Health Ordinance that would prohibit bail.

"Did you tell Dr Yuen about the cocaine, the sodomy, the suicide attempt?'' the prosecutor asked.

"No, he was mostly interested in my medication and my day-to-day life in Siu Lam [psychiatric center],'' she said, at which point she became emotionally excited.

"They have no idea, they have no idea of what you've been through in your life and you just can't go in there and say, `Hey this is what happened to me','' Kissel said, choking on her words.

She said there were many factors that affected her, such as the language barrier between her and others at Siu Lam and the isolation and loss of her children, but she was only asked specific questions about medication.

"There's nothing psychiatrically wrong with me. I'm not suffering from a mental illness. Depression - yes. Feeling sad, feeling remorseful - yes. Suffering from something tragic - yes,'' she said.

Chapman also noted that, in Dr Yuen's first report - made on Kissel's first day in Siu Lam, November 19, 2003 - he had said that she was conscious and alert, spoke relevantly and coherently and that she had denied she had suicidal ideas. Kissel said she could not be sure what she said on the very first day of admission to Siu Lam.

Pointing out that she had said she was a prominent figure in the Hong Kong International School community and was frequently exposed to public occasions as an "ambassador'' for the school, Chapman asked why she did not tell about - and why no-one had noticed - the injuries that had allegedly been inflicted during forceful sex.

"I didn't think about approaching anyone,'' she said.

"Because it wasn't happening, Mrs Kissel?'' interrupted Chapman.

Finishing her sentence, she said it was something she was ashamed of and not something a person talked about at the dinner table or during social gatherings.

When Chapman began questioning her husband's alleged "abusive behavior'' towards the children, Kissel became extremely emotional, saying she was not trying to paint a bad picture of her husband, and that she still loved him.  She said it was during the isolated instances of violence that she became scared.

In relation to one such incident, during a holiday in Phuket, Chapman said: "Your evidence was that Robert Kissel treated her [younger of two daughters] so forcefully that he broke her arm.''

But according to her domestic helper, also present at the time: "Her version of events is a whole lot different from yours. Who's making up the story, you or Connie?'' asked Chapman.  "Connie,''she replied.  

Conchita Pee Macaraeg ["Connie''] had testified that the arm was broken when the two daughters were playing on the floor and the elder daughter jumped onto the elbow of the younger girl.  Kissel said she believed the arm was broken when her husband became irritated with their playing while he was making a business call.

"We both recall the girls running around everywhere,'' but Connie had said it happened during the day, and Kissel said it was unlikely the children would remain indoors during the day while on holiday.

Chapman then asked why - if Robert Kissel's behavior towards the children had unsettled her - did she allow him to take the two daughters skiing over Christmas 2001, and later left him alone with the children over Christmas 2002.  Kissel replied that, on those occasions, it was not her choice to leave him alone with the daughters.

Earlier, the accused said she only realised after "putting it together now,'' that her husband "had a fascination for gay sex.''

Chapman asked: "This shocking and horrific revelation - has that triggered you to seek medical advice - [an] AIDS test, have you had one [now]?''

"No,'' she replied.

"Because you don't believe it yourself, do you Mrs Kissel,'' suggested Chapman.

Chapman will continue his questioning today before Justice Michael Lunn in the High Court.

(Associated Press)  Housewife who killed husband mentally sound.  August 9, 2005.

A prosecutor on Monday sought to establish that American housewife Nancy Kissel knew exactly what she was doing when she allegedly drugged and beat to death her husband in Hong Kong. Prosecutor Peter Chapman told a jury that Kissel's psychiatrist, lawyers and friends didn't find her mentally troubled. In documents presented as evidence by Chapman, Dr. Henry Yuen, a psychiatrist who examined Kissel after she was arrested, described her as "mentally stable, had good reality testing, and not morbidly depressed."

Chapman added that Kissel's lawyer and friends who visited her at a psychiatric facility where she was held didn't detect any psychiatric problems.

Kissel, 41, is accused of giving her husband Robert a milkshake spiked with drugs then bludgeoning him to death during a quarrel in 2003.

She has pleaded innocent to murder but admitted killing her husband, a banker at Merrill Lynch, with a metal ornament. She has not admitted to drugging her husband's milkshake. Kissel testified earlier she and her husband exchanged blows the same day he told her he wanted a divorce and custody of their three children.

Under cross-examination by Chapman, Kissel, who was born in Minneapolis, questioned her psychiatrist's assessment. "You have no idea, you have no idea," she said. "You have no idea of the grieving process that I went through. (Yuen) was there as a prison doctor without having the understanding of what it's like to be there."

(SCMP)  I still love my husband, Kissel tells court.  By Polly Hui.  August 9, 2005.

Nancy Kissel cried out "I still love my husband" in court yesterday after a prosecutor argued she was seeking to paint Robert Peter Kissel as an abusive husband and father.

Prosecutor Peter Chapman also cast doubts on her claims of memory loss surrounding November 2, 2003, the date she is alleged to have bludgeoned her banker husband to death in the bedroom of their Parkview flat. He said Kissel's own lawyer had told the court she had no psychiatric problem or suicidal history in applying for bail last year.

Kissel, 41, said yesterday she had never approached anyone - including her maids, good friends, parents at Hong Kong International School or the rabbi of United Jewish Congregation - to talk about her husband's sexual and physical assaults before her visits to a marriage counsellor, a general practitioner and a psychiatrist in the latter half of 2003. She said she told the doctors of the assaults but did not know if she had told them about the anal sex she alleged her husband had forced on her.

"Who do you think was appropriate [to approach]?" asked Mr Chapman. "I hadn't thought about approaching anyone," she said.

"Because it's not happening, Mrs Kissel?" said Mr Chapman, who argued there was no witness to support her allegations of abuse by her husband. "Because it's something I chose to accept for a number of years ... It was something I was very ashamed of," she said. "Something I am still ashamed of."

Kissel, who also worked as a freelance photographer taking pictures for families, was asked if she had any photographic record of her injuries. She said she was not in possession of her photos.

Mr Chapman asked Kissel, who earlier recalled two incidents when her two daughters were disciplined by their father with force, if she was trying to "paint a picture of Robert Kissel as abusive to his children".

Kissel, who said the violence was isolated incidents that had terrified her, burst into tears. "I didn't try to paint a picture of him ... I still love him. Things happened. I stayed with him. I loved him, and I am not sitting here to paint a bad picture about him, because he's my husband," she said.

Mr Justice Michael Lunn ordered a break for Kissel to compose herself. Remaining motionless in the witness box for five seconds, she then looked at the judge and said in tears: "He's my husband ... It's so hard." She continued crying while returning to the dock.

Mr Chapman also challenged Kissel, who has pleaded not guilty to one count of murder, on the absence of any mention of "amnesia" or "memory loss" in her medical reports in Siu Lam Psychiatric Centre and her refusal to have Henry Yuen, the chief of service at the centre's Department of Forensic Science, who treated her between late-2003 and late-2004, as her expert witness.

Mr Chapman, who read out transcripts of Kissel's bail application last November, said her lawyer at that time, John Griffiths SC, told the court all the medical reports said she was "acting, behaving and sounding perfectly normal". Her friends who visited her at Siu Lam said "she's perfectly normal as she was before". She was subsequently granted bail.

Dr Yuen's report, dated November 19, 2003, a day after Kissel was sent to custody in Siu Lam Psychiatric Centre, said Kissel "attended psychiatric services" and "never had suicidal history". Kissel told the court last week she had attempted suicide by switching on her car engine in Vermont and had searched the internet for drugs that cause a heart attack.

"Was that true?" Mr Chapman asked about the report. "It's referring to my session in Siu Lam. When the [psychiatrist] would ask me specifically if I had any suicidal thoughts while I was in prison," Kissel replied.

"But you've only been there for a day," Mr Chapman said. "I don't know if I said that or not after being there for one day," she replied.

Mr Chapman said the report also stated Kissel's "consciousness level: alert; mood: neutral; attitude: co-operative; speech: relevant and coherent; suicidal idea: deny." Another report, dated May 2004, said she was "not morbidly depressed" and had "good reality testing".

The prosecutor asked if the findings were the reason why she did not consent to Dr Yuen being her expert witness in court. But Kissel said it was the psychiatrist himself who had reservations on whether he would be of help.

Kissel, a prominent parent at the Hong Kong International School, said she "wore a lot of make-up" and "put on a good face" as a disguise as her husband's alleged violence escalated in 2002. "I talked to people how great my life was," she said. "I never once complained to anybody. I never ever showed anything that's going on in my life ... I worked very hard on it in front of my children."

The case continues today. 

(SCMP)  Special rules to control throng of spectators.  BY Polly Hui.  August 9, 2005.

The Court of First Instance yesterday imposed a number of crowd-control measures to avoid a repeat of chaotic scenes last Thursday when 80-odd spectators crammed into the courtroom to hear Nancy Kissel's gripping testimony.

A sign was posted outside the courtroom asking members of the public to queue before entering. People started filing in as early as 9.10am and almost all seats in the public gallery had been taken by the time the hearing started at 10am.

Two marshals guarded the entrance to the courtroom to monitor the crowd, which included expatriates, lawyers and students. New rules stated that when the gallery was full, no more than 10 people were allowed to stand at the entrance. And if spectators left their seats to buy drinks or go to the toilet, they might have to queue again for re-entry.

Belongings left on seats in the gallery - which spectators had used to reserve their spots during the lunch break - would be taken away. 

From the Chinese-language media:

• (Oriental Daily)  Yesterday, Nancy Ann Kissel said during cross-examination that after hearing this case, she believes that Robert Kissel is gay.  Nevertheless, she had been married to him for fifteen years without realizing that until she saw in the court evidence that Robert often looked for gay sex and sex service Internet advertisements.  She claimed that she was shocked, but the prosecutor said that she was deliberating slurring her husband.  At that point, she got very emotional and exclaimed aloud in court:  "I still love him deeply ..."
   
  41-year-old Nancy Ann Kissel said that she only thought that Robert Kissel was intersested in anal intercourse.  She did not realize that Robert had hidden his gay behavior.  When she heard in court from the computer expert that Robert's computer contains many browsed gay pages as well as sexual services in Taiwan and Paris, then she realized that Robert had alternative tastes.  She said that it was frightening to learn that about someone to whom she was married for 15 years and who was the father of her three children.  She said, "If I knew that, I might have taken an AIDS test."
   
  The prosecutor also challenged her assertion that when the family spent the vacation in Phuket in November 2002, that Robert broke their second daughter's arm.  The Filipina domestic helper accompanying them testified that the second daughter hurt herself while playing with her elder sister.  The prosecutor challenged why there should be such a huge discrepancy between the two versions.  The defendant explained that there was a great deal of chaos, so people might have looked at things differently.
   
  When the prosecutor pointed out that Nancy was trying to slur Robert's name, she became quite emotional.  She said that although Robert's behavior scared the children, there was nothing she could do.  At that point, she began to shed tears in court: "I stil deeply love him ... if it weren't for these things, I would still be with him ... I still love him deeply ..."
   
  The prosecutor also pointed out that when the deendant applied for bail, there were two reports from the psychiatrist at the Siu Lam Psychiatric Centre, and neither said that she had a mental problem.  The defendant agreed with the doctor's assessment, but she disagreed with the doctor's statement she seldom spoke about herself or the case.  She said that the doctor was concerned more about her progress than in her person or the problems that she was facing.
   
  The defendant claimed to have tried committing suicide in the garage in the United States; the prosecutor said that her psychiatrist had no such record in his report.  The defendant explained that she thought that the psychiatrist was asking if she wanted to commit suicide during her stay at Siu Lam and therefore did not mention what happened in the United States.
   
• (Ming Pao)  The murder case of former Merrill Lynch managing director Robert Kissel continued yesterday.  During cross-examination, the defendant cried that she still loves her husband although he has done some things that frightened her and the children, but he is still her husband.  If it were not for this matter, she would still be with him and not give up this marriage.
   
  Previously, computer records had shown that during the SARS period in 2003, Nancy Kissel and the children had gone to the United States and Robert Kissel remained in Hong Kong.  Someone used Robert's computer to get on the Internet and looked at many pages involving gay sex and male escorts in Taiwan.
   
  41-year-old Nancy Ann Kissel said yesterday that she only realized that her husband was a hidden gay person until she saw those records in court.
   
  When the prosecutor asked her about her lover, she said that this lover who was 5 to 10 years younger than her, was the best person to talk to about life.  She thought that she had a good time in Vermont.
   
  When the prosecutor asked her if the lover who gave her spiritual support still supported her now, she said: "I don't know.  I have not maintained contact with him."
   
  Furthermore, the defendant had claimed that her husband employed violence against the children.  During one family trip, the children were taken noise and interfering with Robert's telephone call, so he scolded and twisted the arm of the second daughter, causing the arm to break.
   
  Earlier, the Filipina domestic helper had claimed that the second daughter's injury came during play with the eldest daughter.  The prosecutor asked who was lying, but the defendant did not think anyone was lying but they only saw different things on that day.  She only guessed at why her daughter was injured based upon what she saw on that day.
   
  As for the mental condition of the defendant after the incident, Castle Peak Hospital psychiatrist Henry Yuen reported that the defendant was mentally stable during the detention period with no sign of depression.  Yet the defendant said yesterday that she felt that she was depressed for several months before the incident and had sought help from a psychiatrist.

Despite her earlier claims of suffering intense physical and emotional abuse at the hands of her husband, an emotional Nancy Kissel declared Monday that she still loves Robert Kissel, whom she is accused of murdering.

"I still love him,'' she said during cross-examination at the High Court.  Shaking and choking out the words, "he was my husband.''

The prosecution suggested Monday during cross-examination that she did not tell family or friends about the alleged history of sexual abuse she suffered from her former Merrill Lynch banker husband.

Nancy Kissel also said she could not say for sure whether she mentioned the sodomy and cocaine abuse she suffered at the hands of her husband when she spoke to doctors and counsellors, because "there was nothing to tell'' or "because it wasn't happening.''  The court also heard that Kissel's chief psychiatrist Dr Henry Yuen, who had previously reported that the accused murderer was mentally stable with no suicidal tendencies and has made no mention of memory loss, was not granted permission by the defendant to testify in these criminal proceedings.

Kissel, in her fifth day in the witness box, was subjected to another day of questioning about her alleged memory loss and her failure to make concrete reports to friends, family, doctors or the police during the five years she said she was abused.  Since the beginning of her testimony the crowds have swelled to an extent that Monday, two crowd-controlling marshals have been employed to ensure there are no more than 10 persons standing, with a note saying the public may have to queue for re-entry if they leave their seats.

Nancy Kissel said that Robert Kissel's confidante, Bryna O'Shea would not want to hear anything bad about him and that those in the expatriate community in Hong Kong do not want to hear about such issues.  "The alternative, Mrs Kissel, is that there was nothing to tell,'' said Peter Chapman, Senior Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions.

When asked by Chapman to elaborate on her husband's "abusive behaviour'' towards their children, the defendant replied emotionally that she only noted isolated incidents of violence towards her children.  She then said she "still'' loves him, "he was my husband.''

Kissel is accused of serving her husband a pink milkshake laced with sedatives, which left him unconscious at the foot of the bed as she bludgeoned him to death with the heavy metal ornament on November 2, 2003. The decomposing body of Robert Kissel, a former high-flying banker with Merrill Lynch, was found wrapped in a rug, locked in a storeroom at their Parkview residential complex in the early hours of the November 7.

Kissel testified last week that she thought he was going to kill her that night during which they had a furious argument about divorce, resulting his attempt to have sex with her.  In resisting the sex, she knocked him on the head, which resulted in him swinging a baseball bat at her while repeatedly saying, "I'm going to kill you, you bitch.''
She later accepted that she inflicted the fatal wounds with the metal ornament, but said she could not remember any further details about the fight, and her consequent actions, which the prosecutor labelled, "memory gaps that relate to significant events.''

Monday, Chapman pointed out that during her bail application in November, 2004, her instructing solicitor, her close friends, and her chief psychiatrist, Dr Henry Yuen, had made affirmations that they thought she did not suffer from any psychiatric illness.  Using the transcripts of that bail hearing, he noted there was no suggestion by anyone that she suffered from memory loss.

Reading from the transcript, Chapman quoted the Senior Counsel for the accused at the time, John Griffiths; "she is visited monthly by a psychiatrist and there has been no suggestion by himthat she is in need of any help.''

"So, a person with dissociative amnesia doesn't need help?'' asked Chapman. Kissel replied she was not in a position to comment on psychiatric terms.
"I suggest to you Mrs Kissel, that the reason for that (not allowing Yuen to testify), as disclosed in the transcript by your counsel, Mr Griffiths, is there is absolutely no psychiatric problem with you. Do you agree?'' asked Chapman.

"Yes,'' replied the accused, but she said the psychiatrist's report was given in the context of whether she was psychiatrically fit enough to be granted bail, and that indeed, she did not suffer from schizophrenia or any other disorders covered by the Mental Health Ordinance that would prohibit bail.
Since the accused has said she spoke to Yuen about her memory loss, his testimony should in fact help her defence, not hamper it, said Chapman. "Did you tell Dr Yuen about the cocaine, the sodomy, the suicide attempt?'' asked the prosecutor.

"No, he was mostly interested in my medication and my day to day life in Siu Lam (psychiatric center),'' she said, at which point she grew emotionally excited.
"They have no idea, they have no idea of what you've been through in your life and you just can't go in there and say, `hey this is what happened to me','' said Kissel, choking on her words. She said there were many factors that affected her such as the language barrier between her and others at Siu Lam, the isolation, the loss of her children, but she was only asked specific questions about medication.

"There's nothing psychiatrically wrong with me. I'm not suffering from a mental illness. Depression - yes. Feeling sad, feeling remorseful - yes. Suffering from something tragic - yes,'' she said.

Chapman also noted that in Yuen's first report, made on her first day in Siu Lam, November 19, 2003, he said that she was conscious and alert, spoke relevantly and coherently and that she had denied she had suicidal ideas. Kissel said she could not be sure what she said on the very first day of admission into Siu Lam.

Pointing out that she herself has said she was a prominent figure in the Hong Kong International School community and was frequently exposed to public occasions as an "ambassador'' for the school, Chapman asked why she did not tell, and why no-one noticed her injuries allegedly inflicted during forceful sex.

"I didn't think about approaching anyone,'' she said. "Because it wasn't happening, Mrs Kissel,'' interrupted Chapman. Finishing her sentence, she said it was something she was ashamed of and not something you talked about at the dinner table or during social occasions.

When Chapman began his questioning on her husband's alleged "abusive behaviour'' towards the children, Kissel replied in her most emotional state yet; "I'm not trying to paint a bad picture of him, because I loved him and he was not a bad husband, and I still love him. He was my husband, he was my husband,'' she repeated. She said it was during the isolated instances of violence that scared her.

In relation to one such incident, during a holiday in Phuket "your evidence was that Robert Kissel treated her (younger of two daughters) so forcefully that he broke her   arm.''  But according to her domestic helper also present at the time, "her version of events is whole different from yours.  Who's making up the story, you or Connie?'' asked Chapman.  "Connie'' - Conchita Pee Macaraeg, had testified that the arm was broken when the two daughters were playing on the floor and the elder daughter jumped onto the elbow of the younger.  Kissel said she believed the arm was broken because her husband was irritated by their playing around while he was making a business call.

She replied that it wasn't about someone making things up, "we both recall the girls running around anywhere,'' but Connie had said it happened during the day, and Kissel did not think they would remain in the villa in the day during a holiday.

Chapman said that by this time, 2001, "Robert Kissel's behaviour around the children, unsettled and scared'' the accused, yet she allowed him to take the two daughters skiing by himself over Christmas 2001, and then returned early in Christmas 2002, again leaving him alone with the daughters.

Kissel replied that on those occasions, it was not her choice to leave him alone with the daughters.

Earlier, the accused said she only realised, "putting it together now,'' that her husband "had a fascination for gay sex.''

"This shocking and horrific revelation,'' said Chapman, "has that triggered you to seek medical advice - AIDS test, have you had one (now)?''

"No,'' she replied. "Because you don't believe it yourself.  Do you, Mrs Kissel?'' suggested Chapman.