Sunderland footballer, Jack Diamond allegedly raped and sexually assaulted a woman he met on Tinder after she agreed to cuddle with him in bed, a court has been told.
The 23-year-old winger is on trial accused of attacking the woman after he invited her to his house in the northeast town of Washington in 2022.
Newcastle Crown Court heard that the woman told police she messaged a friend following the alleged assaults, fearing that Diamond was contacting his housemate and fellow player about a threesome. The court was told that when the pair got into bed, while ‘it started with cuddling, it became clear that Jack Diamond wanted more’.
Mr. Povall said the woman ‘eventually’ consented to some sexual activity, and woke up sometime later to Diamond ‘caressing her’.
‘She asked him to stop and told him she wasn’t in the mood, but he persisted,’ Mr Povall told jurors.
The court heard Diamond allegedly sexually assaulted and raped the woman, and that she ‘protested’ during both.
‘It was only after repeated protests and pleas for him to stop that he desisted,’ Mr Povall said.
The prosecutor told jurors: ‘Some time later, she realised he was messaging on his phone, and she feared that he was communicating with (Sunderland goalkeeper) Anthony Patterson, his housemate, who had previously raised the possibility of a threesome.
‘She didn’t want to get into that situation. Fearful of what might happen, she messaged a friend, asking for help.
He told her to leave immediately, which she did. Her friend met her at her house, where he saw the very emotional and distressed state she was in, and he waited with her till the police arrived.’
In an interview with police officers played in court, the woman told police she ‘turned over and cried’ after the first sexual assault.
She said he ‘grabbed her wrists’ and was ‘quite aggressive’ during the alleged rape, telling officers: ‘It was like a switch had gone off.’
The court heard after his arrest, Diamond told police that there had been consensual sexual activity but no intercourse, and that the woman was ‘jealous and possessive’.
Sunderland suspended Mr Diamond in March last year when he was charged, while a loan deal with Lincoln City was terminated.