Benjamin Mendy: Rape accuser returned to footballer's home, trial hears

Benjamin Mendy is accused of raping women at his Cheshire mansion

A woman returned to footballer Benjamin Mendy's mansion despite being allegedly raped by him there previously, a court heard.

The 28-year-old is accused of raping the woman, then aged 19, a month earlier at his home in Cheshire.

The woman tearfully told detectives how she woke up in bed with the Manchester City star on top of her.

French international Mr Mendy denies charges of rape, attempted rape and sexual assault.

The jury at Chester Crown Court was also shown footage from a Manchester nightclub, showing Mendy dancing on a table with his trousers half-way down and his top off.

The court heard that the rape took place a month earlier.

After spending time in the swimming pool, the woman went to a top floor bedroom to sleep and said she was awoken by Mr Mendy raping her in the early hours of July 24 last year.

Under cross-examination, Eleanor Laws QC, defending Mr Mendy, asked the woman: "You find it difficult to explain why you went back, not once, 10 times to a house you say you were raped in?

She replied: "I tried to block this out of my mind and forget about it."

The woman later told the court that Mr Mendy was "very rarely" at the house when she was present and she was never alone with him there.

The woman was shown clips from mobile phones and CCTV footage of her at the footballer's house on different days after the alleged attack. It was suggested that in some she was enjoying herself.

Louis Saha Matturie, 41, denies eight counts of rape and four counts of sexual assault

She replied to Ms Laws: "Honestly, I have no respect for you as a woman to take that off my phone and play it in front of a room full of people."

Jurors were also shown CCTV from inside China White nightclub, at around 06:00 BST on August 23, with the woman dancing, wearing a white bikini top with Mr Mendy also present.

Ms Laws suggested she was "perfectly comfortable" in his company.

The woman replied: "He was around. I was with my friend. That night he was so intoxicated he was falling over tables."

Ms Laws suggested that after drinking people do things they would not normally do when sober.

She added: "You have assumed you can't have consented?"

"I didn't, OK?" the woman replied.

'Fixer'

Mr Mendy denies the rape, said to have happened in the early hours of 24 July 2021, along with the rape of two other young women over the same 24-hour period.

He also denies five other counts of rape, one attempted rape and a sexual assault, all relating to seven young women, between October 2018 and August last year.

His co-accused, Louis Saha Matturie, 41, of Eccles, Salford, denies eight counts of rape and four counts of sexual assault, relating to eight young women.

Prosecutors have described Mr Mendy as a "predator" who they claim turned the pursuit of women for sex into a game.

It is alleged Mr Matturie was Mr Mendy's friend and a fixer who had the job of finding young women for sex.

Both men deny any offences and maintain if any sex did take place with women or girls it was consensual.

The trial continues.