A senior Bermuda Regiment soldier was cleared of sexual assault charges yesterday by Magistrate Edward King, who called the complainant's testimony "inconsistent", "tenuous" and "unreliable".

The decision came after defence lawyer Mark Pettingill filed a no-case submission in July, calling the complainant's testimony "inconsistent".

The senior Regiment soldier, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was charged with sexually assaulting the complainant, a male corporal under his command, sometime in January 2000.

The complainant alleged that the senior soldier grabbed him by the belt, pulled down his zipper and reached into his pants - while he stood at attention in a store room.

During the trial, Mr. Pettingill forced the corporal, now a private, to admit that at the time of the alleged offence, he owed the Regiment $700 in fines and faced 21 days imprisonment for missing Regiment duties. In addition, the complainant told several different versions of events to his mother, the Police and the court during trial.

He told Mr. Pettingill that he "mixed things up" because he was "nervous and somewhat scared" in the court room.. And it was later revealed that the senior Regiment soldier gave the younger conscript money to help a family situation and also offered him a temporary residence in the barracks. The conscript said the loan was an advance on his bounty, or yearly pay cheque, and denied having any significant friendship with his superior. Mr. Pettingill told the complainant: "You haven't once been consistent in your story."

The private answered: "I'm doing what's right."

Mr. Pettingill added: "The complainant, through cross-examination, has been discredited to the point were his evidence is unequivocally self-contradictory. "(This is) a serious allegation that certainly warrants a very clear, concise and unequivocal evidence and what we've heard simply does not do that."

Regiment commanders were on leave and unable to comment as to what will happen to the complainant and senior soldier.