A JURY has convicted a Coventry man of rape – unaware until after returning their verdict that he is already serving a nine-and-a-half-year sentence for other sex offences.
And a judge has ordered that a report should be prepared on Zohair Tomari to assess whether he poses an ongoing danger to women before he is sentenced.
Tomari (20) of Lady Lane, Longford, Coventry, had denied raping his 17-year-old victim in 2014, but was found guilty following a trial at Warwick Crown Court.
Only then was it revealed that last month he was jailed for nine-and-a-half years by a judge at Coventry Crown Court after being convicted of trafficking for child sexual exploitation and sexual assaults.
Prosecutor Jeremy Janes said that in August 2014, having been befriended by Tomari, the 17-year-old victim and a 15-year-old girl spent some time at his flat.
At some stage the police turned up looking for the younger girl, who had been reported missing, and the older girl then complained that she had been raped by Tomari.
She said she had not consented to intercourse, and that she had made it plain to him she was not consenting.
“He said to the police, and would say to you now, ‘yes, we did have intercourse, but that was with her full consent.’ Indeed he said that, to a great extent, she initiated it.
“That is the stark choice for you. Both of them can’t be telling the truth, and you have to be sure it’s she who’s right, and not him,” Mr Janes told the jury.
He said that during that night two 999 calls were made by the 17-year-old to the police, which were not completed.
“She was to say that both she and [the younger girl] were subjected to punches or slaps from the defendant.
“She was to say he had a large knife, and the police saw a large knife in the living room consistent with what she was describing.
“She said that at some stage he pushed her into the bedroom. She did not want to have sex with him, but he told her she would do what he said.”
Tomari was arrested, and when he was interviewed he said they had been getting along well, but that he had been drinking too much and went into the bedroom to lie down. He claimed the girl was already there.
But the jury rejected his story and found him guilty of raping her – and the court then heard that last month he had been jailed for four-and-a-half years for human trafficking, with a consecutive five-year sentence for sexual assaults.
Those offences took place in August last year after a car in which Tomari was a passenger pulled up alongside two girls, aged 13 and 14, who were walking to a friend’s home in Coventry city centre in the early hours of the morning.
The young girls were enticed into the car and plied with drink and cigarettes before being taken to a flat over a pub in Lockhurst Lane, Foleshill.
There they were given more alcohol before they were both sexually assaulted by Tomari before being driven back to the city centre where they raised the alarm.
Judge Andrew Lockhart QC adjourned the case until April, and remanded Tomari in custody.
