A WOMAN told the trial of Premier League footballer Benjamin Mendy she saw and heard a girl screaming “rape, rape” at a party attended by the player.
His co-accused, Louis Saha Matturie, then started shouting at the woman to “shut up” as police banged on the door to break up the lockdown-busting gathering last year.
The witness has accused Matturie of sexually assaulting her at a property in Sheffield in late 2016, the jury at Chester Crown Court heard.
Both Manchester City footballer Mendy and his friend and “fixer” Matturie deny a series of rape and sexual assaults on young women.
The woman told the jury the party took place at an apartment on Chapel Street near Manchester city centre at the end of January last year.
She said the young woman had been in an upstairs room with other people, but she did not know who.
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She told police the woman came out of the room “screaming her head off, shouting, ‘rape, rape'”.
The witness told officers Matturie, who was downstairs at the time then, “grabbed the girl and told her to shut up”.
The court heard the police arrived and were banging on the door as the party was during lockdown.
Officers were asking other party-goers about the girl but she had left the flat before police got in, the witness told the jury.
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Earlier, the witness told the jury she was 18 and living and working in Sheffield when she began to socialise with footballers and was then sexually assaulted by Matturie.
Later she began to socialise in Manchester from 2020 onwards and went to numerous parties, some attended by footballers, the “majority” of which took place during lockdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic, she said.
The court heard of a different party at the same apartment on Chapel Street in December 2020 attended by Mendy and his then team-mate, Raheem Sterling.
She was sat on a sofa and ex-Liverpool, now Chelsea winger, Sterling was passing by and tripped over her foot.
Lisa Wilding KC, defending Matturie, asked the witness: “He tripped over you and he was aggressive with you?”
The witness agreed and said Sterling called her “fat”.
Ms Wilding continued: “And you were cross about that?
“One of your friends called him a four-foot gnome and properly insulted him and you felt better?”
The witness replied: “Not cross but confused as to why anyone can be aggressive to someone when tripping over a foot. Non-intentional.”
Prosecutors have alleged Mendy is a “predator” who “turned the pursuit of women for sex into a game”, while Matturie, his friend and “fixer”, is alleged to have had the job of finding young women for sex.
Mendy denies seven counts of rape, one count of attempted rape and one count of sexual assault against six young women.
Matturie of Eccles, Salford, denies six counts of rape and three counts of sexual assault relating to seven young women.
Both men say if any sex did take place with women or girls it was consensual.
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None of the women involved, as sexual assault complainants, can be identified.
The trial was adjourned until tomorrow morning.
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
