Deaf woman tells court she was raped, beaten and treated as slave for 10 years - The Guardian

A deaf and mute young woman who claims she was locked in a cellar, raped and treated as a domestic slave for almost a decade has been giving evidence in court against the couple accused of abusing her.

The woman, whose age is unknown but who is thought to be in her early 20s, told a jury she had been trafficked from Pakistan in 2000 by Ilyas Ashar and his wife Tallat, when she was 10 or 12. She was supposedly hired to work as a domestic help.

She said the pair forced her to sleep on a bare concrete cellar floor and that she had been repeatedly slapped, beaten, raped and sexually abused.

The couple both deny two counts of human trafficking into the UK for exploitation and a single count of false imprisonment. Ilyas Ashar, 83, also denies 12 counts of rape, Tallat Ashar, 66, denies one count of sexual assault and unlawful wounding and the pair, with their daughter Faaiza, 44, deny charges of benefit fraud.

Speaking in sign language and through an interpreter, the woman told Minshull Street crown court in Manchester: "I was sad and weak because I was working so hard. They used to hit me from being very very little, all the time. I used to cook and clean for hours and hours.

"She [Tallat Ashar] used to hit me with her ring, she used to hit me in the face and cut my face with her ring. It hurt. She would scratch me. I would be down in the cellar, sitting alone and very upset. I would sit there for a long, long time, really upset and crying. I could not get out."

At 7am, while the woman was drinking and eating, Mrs Ashar would allegedly come to the cellar, clicking her fingers and demanding she stop and get on with her jobs. Shaking her head and wringing her hands together on her lap, the woman added: "The woman and that man would do that to me. They are bad. I would be sitting in there crying for hours and hours, sitting all alone and upset. I would go to the door and would try to push it open. When the lady came down she would grab my arm and drag me upstairs, slapping and banging my head on the wall."

The couple are also accused of claiming state benefits in the woman's name, which they allegedly withheld from her.

Shown a photo of Tallat Ashar, to identify her alleged abuser, the woman said: "That's the woman who used to hit me and beat me all the time as I was growing up. All through my life she's been hitting me."

She was also shown a photo of Ilyas Ashar, accused of repeatedly raping her. "The old man, he's bad," she replied, "He's the one who has sex with me."

The young woman, who testified by video link, said she was "feeling extremely anxious and nervous" about giving evidence.

Earlier, the court heard the woman met the Ashars, who run a market stall and sell cars near their home in Eccles, Greater Manchester, as a child in Pakistan, where she has five brothers and a sister. She was told her parents had died and recalled having her photograph taken and putting her thumbprint to a document, believed to be her passport. She was allowed into Britain on condition she did not apply for public money.

The woman arrived in the UK on 24 June 2000 with a passport stating she was 19. The court heard that medical tests suggested it was likely she had been younger than 12 at the time. The trial continues.