Alex Salmond trial: First day in full as witness alleges former first minister ‘hunted’ and sexually assaulted her

First witness alleges Salmond “full on pounced on her” on two occasions

The first witness in the trial of Alex Salmond has described how she was “hunted” and sexually assaulted by the former First Minister in two separate incidents in Bute House in the run up to the 2014 independence referendum.

The woman, who was a former Scottish Government official, told how Mr Salmond had “full on pounced” on her on two occasions. However she said she had not felt able to report what had happened as she “did not want to be considered to be one of his women”.

Former Scottish first minister Alex Salmond (centre) leaving the High Court in Edinburgh, on the first day of his trial over accusations of sexual assault, including one of attempted rape.

In the opening day of the trial, in which Mr Salmond is pleading not guilty to 14 charges of sexual assault, the witness - who gave evidence from behind a screen - described how she had been to Bute House for dinners, and had stayed late to “wrap up” the day’s events with the former SNP leader.

However, in May 2014, Mr Salmond had, she said, sexually assaulted her while they were alone in the sitting room.

Describing Mr Salmond as “half cut”, she said: "He was putting his hand down my top and kissing my neck, touching my legs. He just groped me, I don't have another word for it. I froze inside, I verbally communicated that I wasn't happy, I said 'what are you doing, you shouldn't be doing this’, and he found it funny.

"I was embarrassed and I felt humiliated, so no, I didn't speak to anybody because I felt that I had done something wrong almost and I didn't want people to know."

The witness said in June, after a similar event, she had stayed to talk to Mr Salmond as she wanted him to know that what had “happened the other night wasn’t ok and wouldn’t be happening again.” She also wanted to stress that she was in a relationship.

“He was a little dismissive,” she said. “He thought it was funny. I thought it was a line in the sand but his behaviour changed, like he was buoyed up into action by it. Like it was a challenge.”

As the prosecution counsel, Alex Prentice, QC, asked her to describe what happened, she grew audibly upset.

Mr Salmond had, at first sat beside her on a drawing room sofa, she said, then pulled her legs over his, and grabbed at her body. She felt “frozen” and “panicked inside” and was unable “to talk him out of it.”

The woman added: “He was on me. He was trying to kiss my face and neck.”

She said she managed to get off the sofa, but felt he was “chasing her”, and then blocked her exit from the room. “He was titillated by the situation,” she said. “It was clear he wanted me to kiss him back and be ok with him touching me.

“He went full on then, he was in my shirt, touching my chest and breast, under my bra. I was talking to him the whole time trying to get him to stop, that this wasn’t ok. I was saying ‘Alex what are you doing, this is daft, I said it a lot - a million times maybe. It was constant, he wouldn’t stop.”

During what she called “a lull”, the woman managed to leave the room and go upstairs to the sitting room. However, she said, “he had followed me up and was there when I was coming out, and blocked my exit.

“He had his arm over me again, started touching me again and kissing me and kept asking me to stay over. I told him I was going home, but he started becoming more assertive in his sexual advances.”

In an attempt to appease him, she said she agreed to stay in Bute House, if he would go to bed. She had hoped to get into another room, to call for help. “I was so embarrassed this was happening to me, I was humiliated, I was also scared. I thought how the hell do I get out of this? I wish in hindsight I had screamed or kicked him in the nuts, but I was just frozen.”

The witness said she had wanted to get into another room, which was the bedroom once used by Sean Connery, as she believed it had a lock on the door. However Mr Salmond had not gone upstairs to his own room.

“He came in and said he wanted to talk but he had changed his tone. He had a bottle of wine and wanted to have a drink. I was uncomfortable and tense. Then he was suddenly all over me,kissing me, taking my clothes off, it all happened really fast. I was trying to duck, swerve him, and keep my clothes on.

“He was taking his shirt off. He had got most of my clothes off and pushed me towards the bed and I fell backwards. I was in pain.”

She added: “I didn’t have two hands to use. My bra was dangling off my wrist and my tights were down at my knees. I was all over the place.

“I was trying to put my clothes back on and I have this image of him standing naked at the foot of the bed and then he climbed on to the bed.”

Asked if Mr Salmond was aroused, she replied “yes”.

“He climbed on top of me and I tried to push myself to the back of the bed, I was reversing, trying to get away. He lay on top of me. I kept saying, ‘what are you doing, stop’ but he didn’t.”

She said “all parts” of Mr Salmond’s body were touching hers and his “stomach was pressing on me. His private parts were on top of mine. He was telling me he’d be a great lover.”

The witness said she was able to give “one final push” and managed to push him to the other side of the bed. “He rolled over and then he passed out and started snoring”.

The woman says she then wrapped herself in a bed cover and sat in the foetal position trying to be quiet, in order not to wake. Once convinced he was sound asleep, she went to the bathroom and locked the door to get changed. She said she was there for possibly two hours before leaving Bute House by the basement.

“I felt I was a young woman falling in love and I didn’t want any of this to happen. I was humiliated. I felt I was being hunted down, I didn’t want any of it to happen.

“Why would I want to go out with him? He was a much older man who didn’t look after himself, I wasn’t remotely attracted to him. Why would I want to be sexually or romantically involved with him?

“I was in shock for a long time afterwards but I didn’t want anyone to think I had stayed over with him - that would have been the ultimate humiliation.

“I just wanted it not to have happened. I had just been sexually assaulted by Alex Salmond. I felt like absolute hell but I didn’t want to think about it. I didn’t want anyone to know this guy had touched me or been like that with me. He had other women and I didn’t want to be considered as that.”

Mr Salmond denies all 14 charges which have been brought by ten women.

Earlier in the day, in lodging notice of possible defence with the judge, Lady Dorrian, Gordon Jackson, QC, said in four of the charges Mr Salmond believed there to be consent, while in one - the May allegation of sexual assault in Bute House as described by the first witness, there was a defence of alibi. Mr Jackson said that in May 2014 Mr Salmond spent a majority of the month’s evenings at other events, or in London, Aberdeen or Strichen.

A jury of 15 - nine women and six men, were sworn in and heavily cautioned by Lady Dorrian to ensure they reach a verdict based solely on the evidence they will hear.

After the indictment was read out she said: “The accused is a very well known public figure and this case has attracted a degree of publicity. It follows that the requirement that any verdict must be achieved on the evidence in the case and nothing else is of particular significance.”

She also cautioned jurors not to search out any information beyond what they heard in court, stressing they were “judges not detectives”. She said they should not discuss the case with family or friends, and they should put out of their minds “anything you have, in the past, read in newspapers or seen or heard on TV or radio, about the accused and the circumstances giving rise to the allegations.”

She added: “The role the accused has played in public life, his political life, and anything else you might know about him are all irrelevant to the task in hand. You will have your own political opinions but they can have no part to play in your deliberations - all such issues must be cast aside entirely.”

If jurors became aware of any other jurors accessing information about the trial, she said, it should be reported immediately to the court’s clerk.

The trial continues tomorrow.