A U.K. appeals court has dismissed the appeal of former Conservative MP Imran Ahmad Khan, sentenced in April this year to 18 months in prison after being convicted of sexually assaulting a minor in 2008.
The defense has argued that the charge was «weak» and supported by «bad character evidence,» such as the statement of a man who claimed that Khan sexually assaulted him in Pakistan in 2010, two years after he allegedly forced the 15-year-old to drink gin before abusing him.
In turn, they have also made the case that his 18-month jail sentence was too long and should have been a suspended sentence. However, this Monday, three judges have knocked down all these appeals so the sentence remains firm, the BBC reports.
After his conviction, the Conservative Party expelled him from the party. The victim, now 29, told how he approached him at a birthday party that Khan attended as a «friend of a friend» of the boy’s sister. At one point during the celebration, he accosted him on a flight of stairs and took him to a room, where he threw him on the bed and encouraged her to watch pornography before groping him.
The court heard the victim recounted how he was forced to drink gin before being asked to watch pornography and recalled feeling «frightened, vulnerable, numb, shocked and surprised» after Khan, then without political office, touched him until he approached his private parts and tried to sleep in the same room.
The complaint was lodged in 2019, shortly after Khan, who has always denied the facts also blaming the victim for certain traumas, was elected MP in the December general election. At that point, the victim explained, «everything got out of hand» and she opted to take legal action.
