Rapper Slowthai and a friend raped two women at a house party after one of his gigs in Oxford, a court heard today.
The 29-year-old, whose real name is Tyron Frampton, and his co-accused Alex Blake-Walker, 27, are accused of raping the women following his performance at The Bullingdon, in Oxford, on the evening of September 7 2021.
Frampton appeared at Oxford Crown Court alongside his wife Anne-Marie. Both Frampton and Blake-Walker deny three joint counts of rape and one count of sexual assault – the BBC reports.
The court heard that one of the complainants, described as a “huge fan” of the rapper, saw him at a restaurant before the gig and was then added to the VIP list after speaking. Heather Stangoe, prosecuting, told the jury the pair had met a group of friends – including the other complainant – at Frampton’s tour bus.
Stangoe told the court that the group headed back to one of their homes, where the alleged attack took place. The jury was told that Frampton has insisted on two rules – “no phones and no boys.”
“Their sole purpose, the Crown say, in going to that house was to secure sexual gratification,” Stangoe said.
“It mattered not to them whether the subjects of their attention consented or not. As it happened the two women in this case did not but that did not matter to these two defendants.”
Once at the house, two of the women were “isolated” from their friends, the jury was told.
Frampton and Blake-Walker then raped and sexually assaulted the women while “joking” and “high-fiving”, according to Stangoe. She said the attack only ended after a friend of the women found out about what was happening, and then Frampton jumped from the balcony-style roof that the group were on and ran out of the house.
Patrick Gibbs KC, defending Frampton, told the jury that Frampton “met up with his fans in the usual way” following the gig. He said that while being “pretty un-gamely”, the events from that night between his client and one of his complainants were consensual.
He asked the jury to “keep an open mind” during the trial. “What is in dispute is whether the women consented,” he said. According to Gibbs, the case was party about “the difference between willingly consenting to something that is thrilling and exciting in the moment, to then regretting it afterwards”.
He also said that regret and shame maybe lead a person to redescribe what happened. He said: “The effect of celebrity, it may, and it will be for you to decide in due course, whether people behave differently for all sorts of reasons when a figure from their screen steps off that screen.”
Sheryl Nwosu, representing Blake-Walker, said her client denied forcing one of the women to engage in sexual activity. “All sexual contact and acts were consensual,” she said – according to The Independent.
Slowthai was removed from both the Reading & Leeds and Glastonbury line-ups after he was charged in May 2023 at Oxfordshire Magistrates Court. He was nominated for the Mercury Prize for his 2019 debut album ‘Nothing Great About Britain‘, with his second album ‘Tyron’ reaching Number One upon release in 2021. The artist’s last release was ‘UGLY‘, which came out back in March.
The trial continues.
For help, advice or more information regarding sexual harassment, assault and rape in the UK, visit the Rape Crisis charity website. In the US, visit RAINN.
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