VANCOUVER — A defendant in Steven Galloway’s defamation lawsuit testified Tuesday that she believed his accuser, while acknowledging under cross-examination that she had no specific memory of the woman using the word “rape.”

Glynnis Kirchmeier, a former graduate student representing herself in B.C. Supreme Court, closed her case Nov. 10. The trial is scheduled to continue Friday, according to reporting by Brenna Owen of The Canadian Press, published by CityNews.

Galloway, an author and former chair of the University of British Columbia’s creative writing program, denies the assault allegations and says they ruined his career. He is suing Kirchmeier, his accuser and others over what he alleges were defamatory publications on social media and elsewhere.

The accuser, identified as A.B. under a publication ban, contacted Kirchmeier in spring 2016. That was after an investigation by retired judge Mary Ellen Boyd, hired by UBC, found the assault claims unsubstantiated.

Kirchmeier testified that their conversations largely concerned experiences with the university and its equity office. She said A.B. also described feeling coerced into a sexual relationship with Galloway and later mentioned choking in connection with rape.

“So I believed her,” Kirchmeier told the court.

Questioned by Galloway’s lawyer, Daniel Coles, about whether she remembered A.B. using the word “rape,” Kirchmeier replied: “It must have happened, but I don’t remember it.”

Her testimony also addressed earlier advocacy over UBC’s handling of sexual misconduct complaints. Kirchmeier said she contacted David Eby, then the legislator representing the university’s riding, about separate allegations in the history department. She testified that Eby wrote to university officials in November 2015, shortly before allegations against Galloway became public.

A 2018 Twitter post that Kirchmeier acknowledged writing is central to Galloway’s claim against her. In earlier testimony, Galloway described feeling nauseated by one of her tweets and questioned why someone he had never met was calling him a rapist.

The court heard last month that A.B. was no longer asserting as a defence that Galloway assaulted her, but rather that she reported he had. She is not testifying, citing mental health struggles.

Sources