The lawyer defending a man accused of sex attacks on two students compared his plight to that of an accused celebrity as he urged jurors not to ‘condemn him on suspicion alone’.
Zubair Pervez, 21, is accused of going into a teenager’s room at a Manchester Metropolitan University halls of residence in the early hours and intimately groping her. It is alleged that after the 18-year-old fought him off, Pervez went to the room of another female student. This second alleged complainant, who was also 18 at the time, says she woke up in the morning to find him on top off her in bed and her neck covered with ‘lovebite’ marks.
Mr Pervez, a married father-of-one from Hayes, Middlesex, denies two sexual assault charges and insists he did not go into either of the girl’s bedrooms. He was not a student at the university at the time of the alleged incidents - November 30, 2014 - but had a friend who was studying there.
Defence barrister Justin Hugheston-Roberts urged jurors to return not guilty verdicts in his closing speech, saying Mr Pervez’ accusers had had a ‘considerable amount to drink’ and had given accounts which couldn’t be relied upon.
He said a prosecution witness had seen the first complainant kissing Mr Pervez earlier that night, something which she denies. And he said there was ‘no evidence’ Mr Pervez caused the ‘lovebites’ to the neck of the second accuser, who he said had been ‘so blind drunk she had to ask her friends whether or not she had gone to bed with a bloke’.
The jury retired to consider its verdict, before being sent home for the weekend.
