Carl Blood, 37, (pictured) allegedly attacked the woman just five months after he was said to have raped a different woman
A Metropolitan Police officer sexually assaulted a woman on a train while he was travelling home from a riot training course, a court heard today.
Carl Blood, 37, allegedly assaulted her just five months after a different woman claims he raped her after meeting him on dating site ‘Plenty of Fish’.
The alleged victim, who is in her early 30s, said she caught the slow train home to Bedfordshire after meeting a friend at Alexandra Palace, north London.
She met him for a picnic where she drank a few glasses of wine and caught the 11.01pm train from St Pancras and fell asleep.
The woman said: ‘The next thing this guy Carl said: “Where are you getting off?” We were talking about our jobs. He said he was on a riot training course.’
She said he kissed her and she ‘didn’t brush him off.’ She alleged she dropped off to sleep again, but woke to find him sexually assaulting her and undoing the zip on his trousers.
The woman told the trial: ‘I said “I don’t want this” and he backed off.’
Passengers from another carriage arrived and she remained with them until her station. Blood got off at Luton, she said.
After speaking to a friend, she went to the police the next day. Blood gave a statement in which he said she was willing all the way through.
David Lee, prosecuting, told the jury: ‘The issue is consent. She says she fell asleep and woke to find him touching her.
‘The defence is that she was consenting and was embarrassed when people saw her on the train.’
The other woman, who claimed she was raped in January 2016, was interviewed by police after the officer had been questioned about the alleged assault on the train in June last year.
Mr Lee said the woman and the police officer had made contact with each other through the Plenty of Fish dating website.
On their first date they had dinner together and she agreed to go back to his home to watch a film in his bedroom.
But Luton Crown Court heard that she did not give him her consent to have sex and that ‘he did not take no for an answer’.
In her pre-recorded police interview she told how she and the defendant had been talking to each other for 10 days on the Plenty of Fish site.
Blood (pictured) denies rape and assault by penetration and is on trial at Luton Crown Court
They had a meal and she said she learned he was a policeman in the Tottenham area.
Continuing her evidence, she said he persuaded her to follow him in his car back to his flat in Luton so that they could watch a DVD on a TV in his bedroom.
She said: ‘The whole time I was thinking how can I get out of here. How can I make an exit without him hurting me.’
The woman said when he started telling her about attending the scene of a female who hanged herself and cut her wrists she felt even more uncomfortable.
She added that she was on the bed and told her he wanted a ‘cuddle’ and that he started kissing her before unzipping his trousers.
The court heard she told him she did not ‘feel comfortable’ and asked him to ‘get off’ her when he started having sex with her.
Afterwards she said she felt sick and left the flat and got back in her car which parked outside, telling the jury she ‘cried the whole way home.’
When questioned, Blood said it was consensual and believed all the way through she was consenting to sexual intercourse.
Blood, from Luton, denies rape on January 25, 2016 and assault by penetration on June 16, 2016.
Giving evidence today, Blood said he joined the police in 2002 and was based at Waltham Forest, Barnet and Enfield.
He was arrested for the offence on the train while he was on duty at Edmonton police station. He has been suspended from duty since then.#
Luton Crown Court heard that the woman he went on a date with did not give him her consent to have sex but he ‘did not take no for an answer’
Blood said that before the train journey he had been on riot training in Gravesend before going on a date with a woman in London before catching the train home.
He said he felt ‘between tipsy and drunk’ and sat down opposite the woman.
He said: ‘Her head was on a window. She opened her eyes and smiled at me and closed her eyes again. I began stroking her calf with my leg. I liked her. She smiled at me.’
Asked by his barrister Ailsa Williamson if his behaviour was appropriate, he replied: ‘I felt uninhibited by alcohol I had consumed.’
He went on: ‘She opened her eyes and smiled and I sat down next to her and started talking.
‘The kiss was passionate. It was very passionate.’
Ms Williamson asked if the woman had consented to the kiss. He replied: ‘Yes – the kissing lasted for quite a while. There was more than one episode.’
He said that during the kissing she touched his groin area high up and he started to touch her intimately. He denied she fell back to sleep and he touched her.
Sergeant Blood told the jury at some point in the journey they exchanged phone numbers.
Questioned about the rape allegation months earlier, he said: ‘It was a very nice date.’
After a meal he said she followed him back to his flat. He said: ‘At no time did she say ‘No I don’t want sex, get off.’ ‘
Ms Williamson said: ‘Did she say anything to make you think she was unhappy?’ He replied: ‘Nothing at all.’
The trial continues.
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