England star Jack Grealish had sex with a woman at a party held at Man City team-mate Benjamin Mendy’s luxury home, where she says she was later raped by another man, a court heard today.
Grealish is said to have had sex with one woman, aged 23, who was also raped by Mendy’s co-accused, Louis Saha Matturie, it is alleged.
They had all met at China White in Manchester and got a coach back to the mansion, Chester Crown Court was told.
Mendy, 28 and Matturie, 41, deny multiple rape and sexual offences against a number of young women. Both deny all offences.
Grealish was named during a police interview given by a woman and played to the jury.
The woman, aged 17 at the time, alleges she was raped twice by Mendy, the same evening of the party at his house in Prestbury, Cheshire last August.
She said she was told by the woman allegedly raped by Matturie that she had also had sex with Grealish.
The teenage woman added Mendy raped her twice at his home during the gathering, where Mendy’s friends and Grealish’s friends, from Birmingham, were also present.
She told police Matturie asked her to the nightclub in Manchester in the early hours of last August 23.
She arrived at around 3.30am and was outside the club shortly before Mendy and Matturie left.
She said: ‘They were with Jack Grealish. There were a few girls around him but they were taking pictures and video with his friends.
‘The club did not like that. They wanted the pics to be deleted.
‘There was a bit of a talking to. It took a while for them to come out.’
The teenager got a taxi with three other girls and one of Matturie’s friends, and passed around drink on the way to Mendy’s house, where the girls had their mobile phones taken away before going inside, the court was told.
She said: ‘There were already two girls on the couch. They were sat next to Jack. He was already on the couch.’
Matturie then led the 23-year-old woman away ‘hand in hand’ to get more alcohol because, the witness told police, ‘Jack had been demanding vodka’.
Jack Grealish was mentioned in evidence and there is no suggestion of any wrongdoing
Manchester City footballer Benjamin Mendy, today at Chester Crown Court where he is charged with multiple rapes and sexual assaults
Louis Saha Matturie, co-accused of Manchester City footballer Benjamin Mendy, at Chester Crown Court where he is charged with multiple rapes and sexual assaults.
On Tuesday the case heard the teenager had told police she woke up to discover Mendy’s friend and ‘fixer’ Matturie raping her.
The young woman, at the time aged 17, said she had gone to Matturie’s flat near Manchester city centre with a friend in the early hours of April 8 last year.
Matturie, 41, and another man, identified only by the name ‘Ghost’ or ‘G’, was also there and the four of them spent time playing cards, Chester Crown Court heard.
She then said she became tired and Matturie told her she could use the spare bedroom to sleep.
But she was later awoken by being fondled before being raped, she said.
The young woman said she thought the person ‘spooning’ her from behind was the man known as Ghost, but the person had a hood up over his face and did not say anything to her.
It was only after the alleged attack finished and he got up that she realised it was Matturie, she said.
‘I started crying,’ she told police in a video interview played to the jury.
‘I just sat there for a moment, ‘What the hell!’ I ran out crying.
Benjamin Mendy’s friend and ‘fixer’ Louis Saha Matturie of Eccles, Salford, denies six counts of rape and three counts of sexual assault relating to seven young women (pictured Tuesday)
Man City footballer Benjamin Mendy denies seven counts of rape, one count of attempted rape and one count of sexual assault against six young women (pictured Tuesday)
‘When it was happening, I was not properly awake. There was a point where I properly woke up and he got off me.
‘It doesn’t sound like a big deal but it was horrible at the time.’
But Lisa Wilding KC, defending Matturie, questioned the witness’s version of events.
The court heard in March last year, a month before Matturie had allegedly raped the 17-year-old, her friend, aged 19, had told her that she woke up being raped by the defendant.
Under cross-examination Lisa Wilding KC, defending Matturie, asked the teenager: ‘She was saying Saha was a rapist. After she told you that, you carried on going back to the flat?’
‘Yes,’ she replied.
Ms Wilding suggested she was fully aware of who she was having sex with and it was consensual.
She said police later found an email on the teenager’s phone from a company titled Compensation Experts.
Ms Wilding continued: ‘Was it about what you say happened with Saha?’
‘No,’ she replied.
Ms Wilding said: ‘You have deliberately lied about what happened that night and lied to support your friend in her claim against Saha.’
‘No,’ the teenager replied.
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.
The trial continues.