Ben Freeman accused of rape

[sootycat]

I think it was totally unacceptable for him to have to put his life on hold for two years ( whatever the outcome )

Thanks to this little starstruck madam, he has lost his job, and his friends. Even though he has been cleared there will still be people who will treat him with suspicion.

[RitaLittlewood]

I'm sick of these girls/women who throw themselves at blokes (especially famous ones) then cry rape. One of my neighbours was charged with rape recently and it explained by they were so desperate to get out of here. They were gone before it hit the paper. We didn't know them but not many around here liked them. I've argued with friends over it because this girl had an abortion 9 days earlier then was still going round picking up men. They'd already had consensual sex then she claimed a second was forced. As far as I'm concerned when women act like that they're sluts. No one deserves to be raped BUT some women don't half talk crap yet retain their anonimity even when proven to be lying. I have no sympathy with that one because she gladly went to bed with my neighbour in the first place. And as things came out from witnesses about Ben and this girl, she was only too willing but clearly lied because she'd get into trouble.

Patsy

[CG Wendy]

Mud sticks. So even though he`s been acquitted, he`ll carry that rape charge around with him for years.
I`m so disgusted with that 16 YO(now 17) girl. She makes me ashamed to be female.

[RitaLittlewood]

From the Daily Mail:

Former Emmerdale actor Ben Freeman cleared of raping girl of 16 by a hotel pool
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 11:02 PM on 17th October 2008

Former Emmerdale star Ben Freeman has been cleared of raping a girl he met on a Caribbean holiday when she was 16.

Freeman, 28, who had played mechanic Scott Windsor in the TV soap, was overcome with relief when the jury at his trial in Barbados delivered their verdict.

He had met the girl, who is British but cannot be named, when both were staying at the exclusive Almond Beach resort on the island with their families two years ago.

The girl, now 17, told the court she had got to know the actor in a club at the resort where he had joined her, her stepmother and father for drinks.

Two nights later she had found him sitting alone by a swimming pool. They had larked around in the pool and then gone for a walk on the beach.

They then returned to the pool area. Freeman had pinned her down on a sun lounger and raped her despite 'begging him to get off me', she said.

'I kept telling him no but he was just ignoring me. I was crying and I was screaming and just begging for him to get off me,' she said.

But Freeman told the court the sex had been consensual.

He said that when he met her she 'seemed a nice, bright, interesting girl. She was smiling and laughing a lot so she seemed quite fun.'

The actor said her younger age was not a 'difficulty'.
'I knew that she was younger than me the first night we spoke but she seemed mature for her age,' he told the court.

He said that on the night of the sex he had kissed her and she had willingly kissed him back.

They continued kissing on the sun lounger where she had helped him remove her clothes before they made love.

He said that she had not resisted at any stage. But she had become upset when another guest came across them and took pictures of them, saying he would sell them to newspapers.

The girl had then returned to her parents and told them she had been raped.

He said he had been devastated by the allegation and that, since the incident in November 2006, he had been 'released' from his contract with Emmerdale.

His voice broke as he told of the effect the allegations had on his life.

'I have not been able to work, so I've just been at home,' he told judge Margaret Reifer.

On the day he gave evidence, Freeman arrived at the High Court with his girlfriend of four months, 32-year-old actress Sophie Ladds.

He could have faced life in jail if convicted of the charge.

The jury took just 90 minutes to reach a verdict.

With his family and girlfriend - as well as the alleged victim, now 17 - watching on, Freeman stood in the dock looking straight ahead as the foreman of the jury gave their verdict.

Freeman stood unmoved apart from a slight bow of the head, while tears and screams of joy instantly broke out from his family's section to his left.

Friend and fellow actor Glenn Lamont took to his feet to shout 'yes' and Freeman's brother Sam grabbed his shoulder in celebration.

They were told to sit but were able to follow Freeman out of the courtroom moments later, his sister Laura, girlfriend Sophie Ladds and godmother Susie Duguid in tears.

Outside Freeman emotionally hugged his dad Paul, followed by his girlfriend before going round the whole group, with smiles and tears all round.

Inside the court room, the complainant showed no initial reaction to the verdict but broke into tears the moment Freeman walked out.

In a statement, the star said: 'I'm grateful to be vindicated by the jury's verdict and am looking forward to spending time with my family and close friends who have been enormously supportive to me over the past two years.'

The girl, a student from Cheshire, will now remain anonymous while Freeman's name will forever be associated with the trial.
Barbados' Director of Public Prosecutions Charles Leacock QC had told the jury Freeman had wanted a 'fast and nasty... 'quickie' to satisfy nothing but his adamant lust.'

Yet the pale-skinned complainant had no marks on her body.
Despite the pool area being surrounded by buildings with guest rooms, no-one ever came forward to say they had heard or seen an assault. In fact, one guest said he had heard 'pleasurable noises' from her.

The pair were interrupted three times while on the lounger, and at no stage did she raise an alarm.

Under cross-examination, the girl admitted she had 'kissed Ben back' but had 'deliberately omitted' that information from the jury.

On top of that, Freeman's attorney Anesta Weekes QC said her evidence contradicted what she had told police and magistrates on previous statements, even when it came to being attracted to Freeman.

In her closing remarks, she said the girl had made up the rape claim after her parents 'beat her up' when she told them she had sex with him.

A security guard who saw the girl soon after the incident said she did not look distressed and did not mention 'rape' until her stepmother found her and 'attacked' her.

'That's the dreadful truth of what has happened here,' Ms Weekes told the court in her closing statement.

'She panicked because she realised it was all going to come out in the photographs and she made that dreadful choice to lie to please her parents who had beaten her up.'

[RitaLittlewood]

Ben's interview from the Sunday Mirror:


Former Emmerdale actor Ben Freeman speaks of his relief at being cleared of rape

EXCLUSIVE by Paul Henderson in Barbados 18/10/2008

As Ben Freeman walked along a beach in Barbados yesterday, having been cleared of raping a schoolgirl, he declared: “This is the best feeling in the world.”

The former Emmerdale star said: “It’s what I’ve been looking forward to for two nightmarish years.

“When the jury forewoman said, ‘Not guilty’, I obviously felt enormous relief and it still hasn’t properly sunk in.”

Ben said the first person he called was his mum, Caroline.

“I just told her, ‘Not guilty, Mum’,” he said. “She just cried and I told her, ‘Don’t worry any more – you will not have to think about this again’.

“She is so relieved. She has been greatly hurt but she’s always been there for me when I’ve been at my lowest.”

He then called his 97-year-old grandad.

“I was desperate for this to end while he was still alive,” said Ben, 28. “He has been in tears about this so many times.

“I told him, ‘It’s all right, Grandad – it’s over’. Bless him, he could hardly hear but I knew he was over the moon and cried again, but this time they were tears of joy.

“And he asked me when I was going to get round to his place to do the pointing around his patio flagstones.”

When the unanimous “not guilty” verdict came on Friday, Ben showed no emotion, looking straight ahead at the judge from the dock.

But his relatives and friends couldn’t contain their joy. They jumped out of their chairs and yelled: “Yes!”

Ben’s father Paul remained in his seat, waiting until the judge freed his son who had been accused of raping the 16-year-old girl from Cheshire on a sunlounger.

Now Ben is set to go back to Emmerdale – where his character Scott Windsor has been “staying with a friend” in the Army.

Speaking just hours after his acquittal, Ben said: “My feelings are a mixture of anger, joy and relief. I’m not really feeling happiness. I’m angry because I was accused of rape in the first place and I never did it.

“At the time, things happened so fast – I was accused, arrested, charged and a statement was taken all in a matter of hours. I couldn’t believe what was happening to me.

“Everything in my life was falling apart and it was all based on lies. It was complete horror.

“I was being treated like a criminal for the first time. I had to return to the place where I had sex with the girl – they called it the crime scene.

“I had to give my clothes to the police for forensic scientists to examine, several police officers questioned me and I was taken to court that day. I had been on holiday with my two younger sisters, Rosie and Laura, and my stepfather Mike.

“I had to say goodbye to my sisters at the airport. It was horrible. I waited in Barbados for another week to get bail and then I was allowed to return to the UK.

“I am still so angry for my family because they’ve had to go through every horrendous moment with me. My mum is a foster carer and she was told that I wasn’t allowed to stay at her house because she looks after children. I couldn’t even go there for Christmas.”

Ben didn’t rush to toast his innocence in champagne. Instead he sipped a lemonade at a friend’s villa and reflected on the past two years.

“Rape is the most horrendous thing to be accused of,” he said. “You live by your reputation and then suddenly someone is calling you a rapist and the whole world knows about it.

“It is one of the most heinous crimes and when you are accused of it as a well-known figure it is magnified a hundred times.

“It is true to say I’ve lost two years of my life. My single focus was on clearing my name.”

But Ben admits he is not blameless. “I don’t absolve myself from all guilt. I didn’t do anything illegal – but it was very stupid.

“Having sex with a girl aged 16 in an open place was naive and immature. It was a very bad decision.

“It was a mistake with enormous consequences for me and so many others. She was 16. I was 26 and I don’t normally find 16-year-olds attractive. I was attracted to her and she was to me and we were on holiday having fun. It was spontaneous.”

The six-day hearing in the Supreme Court in Bridgetown heard how Ben met the girl in December 2006 in the nightclub at the luxury Almond Beach resort before they had sex on a poolside sunlounger in the early hours of the morning.

He recalled: “The girl’s stepmother came over and asked me to meet her daughter who recognised me from Emmerdale. There was a mutual attraction.

“We both had about three or four drinks in the nightclub bar and the parents were quite happy. The girl told me she was 16 but she was an extremely mature and bright girl.

“But things started to go badly wrong when a guy interrupted us while we were having sex. He came back with a camera and took some pictures and said he was going to sell them to a newspaper. Everything escalated from that point.”

In court, the girl claimed that Ben lifted her out of the pool and placed her on a sunlounger. She said he kept kissing her even though she was begging him to stop.

She alleged he pinned her down and raped her and stopped only when someone complained about the noise. But two witnesses said the sex appeared to be consensual.

“At first I thought it would never come to trial because there was absolutely no evidence,” he said. “I just kept as strong as I could.”

But, unable to bear the burden any longer, he broke down in court. “The first tears came when I was on the stand. It was time to tell my part of the story for the first time and it was very hard."

The cost of the case, including hiring a top lawyer, has been devastating for Ben, who earned £100,000 a year in Emmerdale.

“A man prides himself on earning a living and I couldn’t do that while this was hanging over me. I had a house with no mortgage on it in Leeds and now it is mortgaged to the hilt to pay for my defence costs, which have come to £200,000. I am skint.

“There have been times when I just felt like a monster and people in the street would pull children away from me, saying, ‘Don’t go near that man’.

“On the other hand, a lot of fans have been fantastic sending me letters of support and even coming up to me in the street to wish me well.”

Despite the collapse of the case, the girl’s identity remains protected by law – which Ben fully supports.

“Anonymity for women who have been raped is a fair law and justified,” said Ben. “There should not be anything to stop a woman who has been raped going to the police. But I fear this girl has done an injustice to others who have been raped and might not want to come forward for fear of not being believed in court.”

Not surprisingly Ben found it difficult starting new relationships with women, and didn’t have a girlfriend for 18 months.
Sophie Ladds and Ben Freeman (Pic: Dan Callister)

But now he is dating actress Sophie Ladds, 32, who he met at the Edinburgh Festival while they were appearing in the musical Big Bruvva.

He said: “She’s been very supportive and was relieved to hear the not-guilty verdict in court so that we can put this in the past.”

[RitaLittlewood]

Typically there's a stupid cow in the People cashing in on Ben by saying he texted her a few days later. Why didn't she come out with this at the time?

Patsy

[CG Wendy]

I`m glad she didn`t. It would have hurt his defence.
If those witnesses at the hotel hadn`t have come forward on Bens behalf, it would have been a lot more difficult to find him innocent.
I`m not saying Ben is an angel or anything, but to accuse someone of rape because she 'got scared' is unforgivable. I`m wondering if Ben is looking into suing that girl and her parents for his ordeal.

[RitaLittlewood]

I don't believe her anyway. It never stops these people and she's had all this time to make something up for money. There's no pics of them together like there usually is in kiss and tells.

I changed the title on the first page to reflect the outcome.

I hope he does too. Emmerdale have apparently said they'll talk to him. She is a slapper. Sorry but she shouldn't be anonymous. Women like that, no matter how old, could easily do it again and many have while still keeping their anonimity. The men's lives are ruined if it's false. Double standards.

Patsy

[Deleted]

If he wasn't guilty, then fair enough - it's right that he got off. But he can't be that bright if he didn't see that one coming - young impressionable girl, well-known TV actor, sultry and boozy location?

Neither do I want him back on Emm - I never liked him or his character, and it would probably attract a few extra viewers for totally the wrong reasons.

That all said, I agree with Patsy - it is totally wrong to have double standards in these sort of cases, especially when the guy is proved innocent.

[RitaLittlewood]

I'm sick of all this feminist bullcrap. Equality for men and women in cases like this. Women like her make it difficult for genuine cases and they should be named and shamed.

Patsy

[Lane Kent]

Glad this is all sorted.

On a sidenote when I met him, he made a bee-line for our dogs and seemed a genuine person. You can get a feel for people. Okay your gutt feelings aren't always correct but there was always something not right about this girl's story.