Tweed denies using teenager as sex object

Jack Tweed today denied using a teenager “like a sex object” as he targeted the “shyest, prettiest girl” to rape in a dark room.

Tweed, the widower of 'Big Brother' star Jade Goody, denied he was simply using the woman, who was just 19 at the time, for sex, saying he thought she was pretty and felt there was “a strong mutual attraction” between them.

But he told the jury trying him for rape that he had no idea another man was in the room spying on them until his friend Anthony Davis knelt on the bed and started having oral sex with the same woman.

Tweed and Davis, 26, both deny raping the teenager at Tweed’s east London home in the early hours of September 4 last year.

Under cross-examination by Linda Strudwick, for the prosecution, Tweed denied he was using the woman, now a 20-year-old student from Hertfordshire, “like a sex object”.

He also denied he “targeted the shyest, prettiest girl and got her in to a darkened room together” with Davis in an “agreed plan” for sex.

“I didn’t know he was there until he got on the bed,” Tweed said.

He added that the sight of Davis’s penis made him feel sick, so he stopped having sex and left the room.

Ms Strudwick said: “You could have left that girl in a vulnerable position, about to be raped by a man whose sexual deviance is plain.”

Tweed replied: “She didn’t have to put her hand there and start masturbating him.”

Asked repeatedly if he would have found it “creepy” or odd if he had known Davis was watching him have sex with the woman, Tweed insisted he would not have been angry.

“It’s not something I would do,” he said.

“I wouldn’t really have been cross, I just wouldn’t have liked it.

“Some people do that, some don’t. I’m sure I could forgive him.”

Tweed insisted he did not know Davis was in the room until he started kneeling on the bed to have oral sex.

Asked how he did not see him when he would have been facing Davis and just a metre away from where he was stood, Tweed said he was kissing the woman “all the time”.

Tweed also denied he changed his version of events since making his defence case statement last month in a bid to help Davis.

But he admitted he did not originally say the woman told him she was on the pill, nor that she masturbated Davis.

Asked about the discrepancies between his statement and his evidence today, Tweed said his solicitor “wrote what he thought best and I signed it”.

The victim has told the jury of six men and six women she was “frozen with fear” and went into “complete lockdown” when Davis joined Tweed on the bed and they both raped her together.

Earlier, under cross-examination by Sean Minihan, for Davis, Tweed also denied pestering the woman for a threesome, trying to grab her knickers and lifting up her dress.

Later, asked by judge David Radford, the Honorary Recorder of Redbridge, if he asked Davis ``What the hell are you doing?'' or anything like that when he became aware of his presence, Tweed said: ``No.''

Giving evidence earlier today, Tweed, who stood with his hands behind his back and spoke confidently, told the jury sex with the teenager had been consensual.

He said their eyes met in the dark room after they had been talking about whether either of them was seeing any one.

“She was flirty towards me and very friendly,” he said.

“I may have made the first move. She was kissing me back and had her arms round me, running her hand through my hair and down my back.”

The jury was told the young woman went with her friends to Tweed’s house in Brandesbury Square, Repton Park, Woodford Green, east London, after a night out at the Embassy Club in Mayfair.

The woman said she initially tried to laugh off Tweed’s advances, but he soon became “more heavy-handed” and the situation changed when Davis stood inside the bedroom and told Tweed: “Don’t worry Jack, I’ve got the door, do what you’ve got to do.”

Tweed raped her by the window sill and, as she tried to escape, pushed her on to the bed, she said.

Tweed then raped her again, with Davis orally raping her at the same time, the court heard.

Tweed, who married 'Big Brother' star Goody, 27, shortly before she lost her battle against cervical cancer in March 2009, denies two counts of rape.

Estate agent Davis, of Stradbroke Drive, Chigwell, Essex, denies one count of the same charge. Both defendants are on bail.

The trial was adjourned to Thursday.