A former town mayor helped her son to hide evidence when he was arrested at her home for raping a 15-year-old girl, a court was told.
Naheed Ejaz, 61, who had recently completed her one-year term as mayor of Bracknell Forest in Berkshire, allegedly refused to let police officers into her home when they came to arrest her son, Diwan Khan, 41.
The Labour councillor delayed the officers’ entry for “some minutes” and spoke to her son in Urdu to assist him in hiding his phone, which allegedly had a video of the sex attack on it, the court was told.
Ejaz was the mayor of Bracknell Forest in Berkshire, a borough that includes Bracknell, Crowthorne and Sandhurst
Ed Wylde, for the prosecution, told the jury: “A mother’s love for her son will stretch some way, and in this case it stretched into criminality.”
Khan, who acted as the mayor’s consort during his mother’s time in office, is accused of giving a 15-year-old girl vodka laced with MDMA, a form of methamphetamine, and raping her after she “blacked out”.
The teenager said she woke up in the back seat of his car with no clothes on and could not remember what had happened. Khan allegedly showed her a two-minute video of him choking her and slapping her in the face.
Khan allegedly messaged the girl later to say that he would show her mother the video if she said anything and that she “belonged” to him.
During the girl’s police interview, she said that Khan had told her he was the mayor’s consort and that he would “slit her throat” if she told anyone about the attack in June 2024. She said the video had made her feel sick.
Ejaz and Khan are on trial together at Winchester crown court. Ejaz denies perverting the course of justice and Khan denies rape. He has admitted perverting the course of justice by hiding a mobile phone from the police.
Ejaz, who said she was proud to be the borough’s “first Pakistani Muslim mayor”, served a one-year term from May 2023 until May 2024. She resigned as a councillor in October 2024.
The court was told that police arrived at her house in Bracknell in the early hours of September 12, 2024.
Wylde said it was Ejaz who answered the door to the police. “When the police came to arrest Mr Khan, she delayed opening the door and helped him hide his mobile phone,” Wylde said. “That mobile phone was likely to have material that would be evidence in Mr Khan’s case.”
Khan gave a phone to the police but it was not the one with the video, Wylde said. He added: “We say they were speaking in Urdu … so the police wouldn’t know what they were talking about.”
Ejaz pictured on the mayor’s official social media account
The court was told that alleged victim had arranged to meet her friend, who said she knew a man who could take them for a drive. The two girls drank from a bottle of Smirnoff vodka, to which Khan was said to have added powdered MDMA, also known as ecstasy.
Khan allegedly told the two girls that he was “horny” and that he wanted them to touch him, but they both said no. He dropped the friend home then drove the 15-year-old girl to his house, the court was told.
She told police she had drunk about half a litre of the vodka by this point, then “blacked out” and did not remember what happened next until she woke up naked.
In his police interviews, Khan denied picking the girl up in his car and he denied raping her. He said he had met her on a dating app called Plenty of Fish and that he thought she was 24 years old.
Wylde said that the girl’s dating profile stated that she was 19. He added: “At the time she was 15. She was quite troubled, quite rebellious. She snuck out at night, she drank alcohol, she took drugs. She may have got things a little wrong.
“We say those factors are exactly why he chose her because he knew she wouldn’t be believed.”
The trial continues.