May 10 2011 by Dave Goodban, Flintshire Chronicle
A MAN and a woman have gone on trial accused of rape amid allegations that they treated the complainant as a sexual plaything.
Hairdresser Paul Kershaw is alleged to have had sex with the woman against her will.
Co-defendant Lisa Marie Rodda also faces a rape charge for allegedly encouraging him and holding the woman down.
Kershaw, 34, of Claypit Lane in Rowton, Chester, and Rodda, 40, of Sidmouth Road, Ashton upon Mersey, near Sale, both deny rape.
Rodda had been out in Chester on a race night and met Kershaw, who had previously done her hair at his salon at Tarporley.
The couple went back to a house in the Hawarden area of Flintshire and had sex in various places around the house – including on a trampoline in the garden.
Prosecutor Simon Mills said that they then went into a bedroom and sexually assaulted the complainant.
Later it was alleged that she had been raped when she was held down by both on a sofa.
Rodda was alleged to have been encouraging Kershaw and holding a door closed at one stage while the alleged rape took place.
“In a nutshell the prosecution case here is that in the early hours of June 26 last year these two defendants, fuelled by drink, lost control of their sexual inhibitions, indeed of any concept of restraint,” said Mr Mills.
They treated the complainant ‘as a sexual plaything’, knowing full well that she was not consenting to what was going on, he alleged.
It was the prosecution case that Rodda played a full part in what Kershaw did to the complainant, Mr Mills said.
He added: “That was not only by encouraging and supporting him in what he did to her, but also by physically holding the complainant while Kershaw assaulted her.”
Mr Mills told the jury of eight women and four men that in his interview Kershaw – who ran his own salon and who at the time had a girlfriend – admitted that he had sex with the complainant, but he claimed that it was with her consent.
Rodda said in her interview that there had been some ‘larking about’ between the three of them, but she said that she was not a participant in any criminal offence.
“In other words, both the defendants in their different ways say that the complainant has invented the account,” Mr Mills said.
The trial at Mold Crown Court, which is expected to last a week, continues.