Beaten and Raped Wife Unable to Deport Husband...

A Bradford woman in an arranged marriage was raped countless times by her violent husband after failing to get him deported, a jury heard.

The Pakistani man told her: “I can force you, I can do what I want with you,” it is alleged.

The 27-year-old man, who cannot be named to protect the identity of his wife, denies eight offences of rape.

Prosecutor Richard Gioserano told the jury at Bradford Crown Court yesterday that the woman’s family arranged her marriage.

It took place in Pakistan in 2006 when she was 29.

After the wedding, she returned to the UK and her husband joined her when his visa came through.

Mr Gioserano said the marriage was unhappy and the defendant began hitting his wife.

She moved in with her parents and wrote to the Home Office saying her husband had subjected her to violence and abuse.

“She did not know where he had gone but asked that he be deported so that she could carry on her life without fear,” Mr Gioserano said.

Her husband contacted her some months later, saying the Home Office had decided not to deport him, the court heard.

He told her he was sorry and that he would not hit her again, and apologised to her parents, it is alleged.

Mr Gioserano said he must have known that his wife now had her own house, that he was coming to the end of his two-year visa and that he needed her help to remain in the UK.

The couple got back together but he began hitting her again, the jury was told.

“Things started to get a whole lot worse. The violence continued and, with the violence, came rape,” Mr Gioserano said.

He told the court: “The prosecution say that for the best part of six months, behind the closed doors of their home, this defendant would regularly force himself upon his wife.

“Against a constant background of violence and fear, he would have sex with her whenever he wished – sex to which she did not consent and he did not reasonably believe that she did.”

The court heard that the first three charges were sample counts because the man “did it so often”.

The rest were on specific occasions around the time of Eid last year.

“After that, she decided things were so bad that she had no option but to tell her family,” Mr Gioserano said.

He said the defendant told the police he found out his wife was involved in some way with another man. She begged for forgiveness but must have feared he would tell on her, so she turned on him first.

The trial continues.

In a recent fatwa, Sheikh Maulana Abu Sayeed, president of the Islamic Sharia Council in Britain (the UK’s largest network of Sharia courts), said the following:

“Clearly there cannot be any rape within the marriage. Maybe aggression, maybe indecent activity… Because when they got married, the understanding was that sexual intercourse was part of the marriage, so there cannot be anything against sex in marriage. Of course, if it happened without her desire, that is no good, that is not desirable.”