Imran Ahmad Khan: Teenager scared by MP sex assault, trial told

A man was left "scared and shocked" after an MP sexually assaulted him when he was 15 years old, a court has heard.

Imran Ahmad Khan, now 48, is accused of groping the boy at a house party in Staffordshire in 2008.

In an interview played to jurors at Southwark Crown Court, the man, now 29, described how Mr Khan groped him in his bunkbed.

Mr Khan, who was elected as the Conservative MP for Wakefield in 2019, denies one charge of sexual assault.

The man told police Mr Khan had forced him to drink a gin and tonic and remembered the blue Bombay Sapphire bottle the MP had taken to the party.

"It was being forced on me and going up my nose a little bit," he said.

"I kept saying, 'I don't like it, I don't like it', and he kept forcing us to drink and I kept feeling a bit weird - something's not right here, he's making us drink."

He described how Mr Khan had also watched him doing pull-ups, asked him to watch pornography and then followed him after he went to bed.

"He was drunk because I could hear his heavy breathing," he said.

He added that the defendant had reached through the wooden bars of the top bunk and touched his feet.

Despite the teenager asking Mr Khan to stop, the "slow caressing" continued and he worked his way around the bed, the court heard.

"His breathing was getting quite heavy and I kept pushing his hand away and pushing it back and it would keep coming," the man said.

The moment Mr Khan realised he could reach over the bunkbed bars was "like a lightbulb on the top of his head", he told police.

"It was like pouncing, there was no more subtlety. I was scared, vulnerable, numb, shocked, surprised.

"I didn't think it was real for a lot of it and it felt like it was going very, very quickly and very, very slowly at the same time.

"When he got to my groin and was about to touch my testicles it was sheer panic."

The man said he then "freaked out" and jumped out of the bed and fled.

Prosecutors previously told the court that police had been called at the time but the teenager did not want to pursue the case.

The man, who cannot be named, then contacted police after Mr Khan was elected to Parliament.

In his interview, the Labour supporter said his complaint was not politically motivated.

"I don't think it's right that a person is in a public office who has done this. I want this person to be convicted of the wrong he has done, so it can't happen to anyone else."

Mr Khan, who is gay, in answering police questions said the teenager "became extremely upset" after a conversation about his confused sexuality.

During cross-examination, defence barrister Gudrun Young QC suggested the complainant had given three "contradictory" accounts.

"I would disagree with you," he replied.

She also suggested Mr Khan had asked the boy what pornography he watched to find out where his "true sexual proclivities lay", after the youngster told him he was confused.

"You got into a conversation with an older man in which you were out of your depth, uncomfortable, and when he mentioned which pornography you watch, you became extremely upset and jumped up and ran out of the room," she said.

"No, that's not what happened at all," he replied.

The trial continues.

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