A woman has accused two men of rape after they picked her up as she drunkenly walked a city’s streets, a court heard.

The unnamed woman alleges Hayleab and Tesfit Brhane, 19 and 20, carried out the assault when she was too intoxicated to consent.

However, Hayleab and Tesfit , who deny the allegations, claim the woman agreed to intercourse with them both and made up the rape allegations because she felt ashamed.

The woman had drunk the equivalent of a bottle-and-a-half of wine and smoked cannabis when she decided to venture into Canterbury city centre alone one evening last year, a court heard.

After meeting both men they took her via taxi to Hayleab's home in Downs Road, where she allegedly "passed out" before the reported assault.

Paul Valder, prosecuting, explained: "She got into a taxi with the two men and says her head was spinning.

"She says they escorted her upstairs, took her into a bedroom, and describes herself as being really drunk.

"She collapses on the bed, comes around and Tesfit is having intercourse with her - she was trying to get him off.

"She can remember him saying something like 'it's OK baby'."

The court heard when the woman regained her strength and accused the duo of rape, Hayleab fled the room and Tesfit replied: "You liked it."

Hayleab is said to have raped her while she was unconscious.

In a police interview played at Canterbury Crown Court as the trial opened yesterday, she said: " 'I asked who did this?'

"And they pointed at each other.

"I punched (Tesfit) in the face and said 'you raped me.'"

The court heard she escaped the house and a number of onlookers discovered her hysterical and struggling to breathe outside.

Hayleab was arrested the next day and Tesfit handed himself in at Brixton Police Station, where he lives, shortly after a KentOnline police appeal.

When the interviewing officer asked if she would be able to recognise Tesfit she replied: "Yes. Every time I close my eyes I can see him."

DNA tests carried out on the victim soon uncovered semen specimens from both men.

However, the pair insist the woman consented to intercourse with them both and was not as drunk as she claims.

Standing behind a screen under cross-examination, Tesfit's barrister David Osborne asked her: "Is it the position that having had sex with two young lads you were alarmed by it and felt ashamed?

"What I would suggest is that you were feeling shameful and you were perhaps worried about these two lads talking about what they did with you."

Paul Jackson, barrister for Hayleab, argued the woman agreed to join the men back at the property, "was hardly drunk at all" and then consented.

"It wasn't consensual," she replied.

The trial continues.

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