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A Royal Mail worker allegedly raped a young woman in an alleyway after accosting her as she walked home from a night club.
Gheorghe Bertlef kissed and had sex with the woman even though she told him not to and pleaded to be allowed to carry on home, Exeter Crown Court was told.
She was walking alone after visiting the Unit One club in Exeter at 2.45am on November 13 last year when he approached her from behind Hoopern Lane.
She had never seen him before and was so frightened that she froze during the alleged sexual assault, which happened when he took her into an alleyway and blocked her path when she tried to leave.
(Image: Howard Lloyd)
Bertlef had followed a group of four female students near Exeter University earlier the same night and one of them had been so alarmed by his behaviour that she took a picture of him on her phone.
He was arrested eight days later when police saw him approaching two different lone women in the centre of the city.
He told officers he walked around the street at night regularly hoping to meet women. He said he had not had sex before and felt intimidated talking to women during the day.
Sorting office worker Bertlef, aged 31, of Pinhoe Road, Exeter, denies rape and attempted rape against the same complainant.
Mr Jason Beal, prosecuting, said Bertlef accepts that he had oral sex with the woman and tried to have vaginal sex with her in the alleyway, but he says she consented.
Mr Beal said the complainant had been out with two friends to the night club and was walking home on her own after they had both peeled off to their own accommodation. She had been drinking wine and shots but was not stumbling or staggering.
(Image: Howard Lloyd)
He followed as she walked up Hoopern Lane and through a pedestrianised area close to Prince of Wales Road.
Mr Beal said: “She did not know him and became aware of a man appearing from her right hand side who looked at her and said hello. She nodded back and said hi and carried on walking.
“He came up closer to her and said she was very beautiful. She thanked him and he put his arm around her shoulder and asked if he could kiss her. She said no.
“He asked her why not and she said she thought she should go home. Despite that, he started kissing her. She did not kiss him back and carried on walking.
“She was anxious not to do anything that would inflame the situation. He pulled down her top and bra and began kissing and sucking at her breasts. Her way of coping was not to say anything and pretend it was not happening.
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“He pulled her down a small alleyway and asked if she wanted to have sex. She said no.
Mr Beal said Bertlef called himself Michael. He partly removed a bodysuit she was wearing and made her crouch down while he had oral sex with her. He tried to have vaginal sex but did not succeed and then had oral sex again.
He said she was frozen in panic but did tell him she wanted to go home. He moved into her path to stop her leaving.
She got back to her home shortly after 3am and called the police after breaking down in tears. She told police ‘I shut down and just did what he said. I became like a robot’.
She was able to give a description of the man which tallied with the photo taken by one of four students who had seen him two hours earlier in Mount Pleasant Road.
Mr Beal said a plain clothes officer saw him following a lone woman in Blackboy Road, Exeter on the night of November 21. He was arrested shortly afterwards while doing the same thing in Victoria Road.
He told police he was out looking for women to have sex with but said he thought the complainant had consented to sex in the alleyway.
The trial continues.
