Jury out in trial of three accused of sexually abusing schoolgirl

THE JURY is out in the trial of three men accused of indecently assaulting a schoolgirl.

THE JURY is out in the trial of three men accused of indecently assaulting a young girl.

Riaz Makhmood (39), Sajid Ali (38) and Zaheer Iqbal (39), all from the Masbrough area, deny a total of 15 offences against a girl under the age of 14 in 1994.

The jury in their trial at Sheffield Crown Court went out this morning.

During the trial, the men’s lawyers claimed the girl may have mixed them up with someone else or that she is simply lying.

The offences are said to have taken place in a graveyard and car park in the Masbrough area after the alleged victim was plied with alcohol.

Ali (38), of James Street, is accused of seven offences, Zaheer Iqbal (40), St John’s Avenue, five and Riaz Makhmood (39), of Falding Street, three.

Ali was known as Sos, Iqbal as Booty, and Makhmood as Raz, the court heard.

The alleged victim, now 35, told police that she would be given alcohol and passed around the defendants “one after another” and that she had thought she was making Ali happy.

“She knew it was wrong, but they made her feel special,” said Ms Drake.

“The defendants would say they would tell her mother what she was doing and called her a slag — this scared her.

“This was a way of controlling and pressurising her.”

Mr Glenn Parsons, for Ali, said around the time of the allegations Ali would have been around 15 and 16 and she had mistakenly identified him or “made it up”.

The woman said she had known Iqbal by the name of Booty and that he was small and smelt of smoke.

Mr Andrew Andrew Dallas, for Iqbal, said: “You were confused, the distinctive name of Booty and the distinctive situation is someone else.”

The woman answered: “I am not confused at all.”

Zaiban Alam, for Makhmood, said the first time the woman had mentioned her client by name was in her police interview in 2016.

Ms Alam said: “In that interview you told police his name was Raz or Razza.

“That was when you gave police the fifth account of these incidents — why could you not give his name to the police previously?”

She answered: “His face sticks in my mind even if his name doesn’t.”

 

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