A YORK nightclub deputy manager has told a jury that she found a police file in a drawer with clothes belonging to a doorman under investigation for a violent assault.

The doorman, Paul Douglas, 30, is alleged to have told a fellow suspect that the case against them would never get to court and that the victim would "receive a visit".

The prosecution claims that Douglas's girlfriend, PC Clare Woodall, of York police, gave him the file containing the victim's address and phone number shortly after the assault in December 2000.

Woodall and Douglas, then a doorman at the Gallery nightclub and living in Holmesfirth Oval, Harrogate, deny conspiring to pervert the course of justice. The policewoman denies misconduct.

Sarah Mason, then deputy manager of Tofts nightclub, said she found a police incident log of the assault in a drawer containing Douglas's clothes. She was preparing to leave the home they then shared as their relationship had broken up.

"I asked him what it (the log) was," said Miss Mason at York Crown Court. "He said it was the name and address of the gentleman that had been assaulted at the Gallery nightclub."

"Was anything said about the reason it was in his possession?" asked prosecution counsel John Burgess.

"He said the gentleman that had been in the assault could be contacted."

She later handed it in to police.

Doorman Marc Ward said he was on duty at the Gallery with Douglas when the assault occurred. On the next shift Douglas showed him a copy of the incident log and said that attack victim Ashley Tunstill would get a visit.

Mr Ward also alleged that Douglas told him the case would not get to court.

The court heard different accounts of whether Ward's manager, Anthony Stannard, gave him the log, including Mr Stannard's denial of ever seeing the log.

Opening the prosecution, Mr Burgess said police found several of Douglas's fingerprints and one from Woodall on the log.

He said they were having a relationship at the time of the assault and Douglas contacted Woodall by mobile phone within about three hours of the attack.

"She (Woodall) was his (Douglas) most direct and obvious contact with North Yorkshire Police," said Mr Burgess. "They were in touch with each other a significant number of times on the 27th and 28th of December and he ended up with that incident log which had her fingerprints on it".

When arrested, Woodall claimed that she believed at the time of the night club attack that Douglas was an undercover police officer. She said she had never knowingly touched the incident log.

Douglas gave no reply when interviewed by police. In a written statement he said Woodall had given him the log, but he had never asked her for it.

The trial continues.

Updated: 11:06 Wednesday, March 20, 2002