An Albanian man accused of kidnapping and raping a woman who had come out of a Bedford night club told a jury: “I am not a rapist.”
Gemti Hyka, 31, denied that she was confused and disorientated, saying: “I was asking her ‘Are you ok?’ She kept saying: ‘I am OK.’”
The prosecution at Luton Crown Court allege the 23-year-old woman was kidnapped, held prisoner and raped by three men on her first night out in Bedford after the end of Covid restrictions.
The woman was with a friend, but lost her when they came out of Vogue night club in the High Street in the early hours of the morning.
Her friend said earlier that she went right and the victim went left to avoid a group of men fighting in the street.
The friend, also 23, spent half an hour looking for her on her own and was then joined by a male friend on the search. Finally at around half past seven in the morning she said she received a call from the friend who had been crying.
She said she was at Kempston police station and said: “I need Mum.”
Gemti Hyka, 31, of Cambridge Road, Bedford, denies kidnap, false imprisonment and four charges of rape of the woman.
Vullnet Haka, 33, of Washburn Close, Bedford and Ibrahim Bezati, 36, of Caves Lane, Bedford deny false imprisonment and four charges of rape of the woman.
The defendants are aided by Albanian interpreter.
Questioned by Martin Mulgrew, prosecuting, the victim said: “I have no memory of getting out of the club.”
When she was in a house in the early hours of September 4, 2021, she went into “survival mode.”
The woman went on: “I begged them to let me go. I was confused and scared.” She said she would never agree to leave with someone she did not know and said she did not agree to have sex with anyone or sexual activity with anyone.
Her friend told the jury that they had gone for dinner at Zizzi in Bedford, where they ate Pasta and drank two bottles of wine between them.
They went on to the Slug and Lettuce, where they had a cocktail, a glass of wine and a Tequila shot, before going into Vogue nightclub.
She said it was their first night out after the lockdown. At one point she saw her friend receive a kiss from a man on the dance floor.
“I told him to leave her alone and he left,” she said. On a scale of 1 to 10 she was asked how drunk her friend was. She replied “7 or 8” Cross-examined by Martin Mulgrew, for the prosecution, Hyka denied the woman was frightened when she was in his car.
He said he had not locked her in his car when he stopped at a BP garage. When they got to the address he said she agreed to have sex.
He said: “She never cried when she was with me. I never did it. I am not a rapist.” Hyka denied that he and the other men spoke in Albanian and laughed at her.
Case proceeding
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