“I FELT like I was at fault as well,” said the alleged victim who told police he was sexually abused when he was five years old.
Ashley Hookway, 33, is on trial at Oxford Crown Court charged with eight counts of child sexual abuse which is alleged to have occurred in the early 2000s in Witney.
It is alleged that Hookway sexually abused a boy, who was at his youngest five years of age, when Hookway himself was aged between 11 and 14.
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The boy, who is now an adult, cannot be named for legal reasons. He first reported the allegations to police in late 2020.
Hookway, of Shaw Court, Aylesbury, has denied the offences and is now on trial which is expected to last four to five days.
During the trial on Tuesday (July 30), a recorded police interview with the complainant was played to the jury.
He talked to police about what reportedly took place when he was a child.
“My earliest memory came in about the age of four,” he said. “From about that age I was being abused sexually by Ashley Hookway.
“The first time I remember it happened I knew it had happened before at the point. It continued every time I would see him.”
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Describing one alleged incident to police, the complainant said: “We were both upstairs and the door was closed.
“I remember him asking his top off and he encouraged me to do the same. Shortly after that, I remember he said, ‘What should we do then?’ and he got his penis out and started pulling at it.
“He did to me and I did it to him. He rubbed the end of the penis. I can’t remember what he said. It continued for a little while…of us touching each other.”
The complainant said he ‘didn’t understand’ what they were doing so had not told anyone at first.
“I never said anything or tried to get away beforehand,” he said.
“For a long while I thought what we were doing…I didn’t understand what we were doing.
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“Not that it was right but it was okay but then I realised it was wrong and by that point I was scared he’d get in trouble and I’d get in trouble.
“I felt like we were being equal partners at that point. I felt like I was at fault as well for what was happening.”
The trial, which is expected to last several days, continues this week.
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