An “Asian grooming gang” has been accused of exploiting, trafficking and raping girls in a Welsh seaside town, a court has heard.
Three teenage girls were treated as “sexual commodities” and exploited by a gang of men in in Rhyl, north Wales over a period of two years.
The four defendants allegedly pressured the girls into providing sexual services in exchange for cannabis and cocaine.
Mustafa Iqbal, 43, Ziaullah Badsha, 25, Mohamed Arshad, 36, and Jaswinder Singh, 65, face 28 charges between them, including trafficking for sexual exploitation, rape, supplying drugs and sexual assault – all four deny the charges.
Owen Edwards KC, prosecuting, told the jury that two girls aged 14 and 15 were out walking late one night in Rhyl when they were spotted by Iqbal, who was riding an e-scooter and worked as a drug dealer and takeaway driver, the Daily Mail reports.
Mr Edwards said both girls had been smoking cannabis and were “obvious targets for predatory older men”.
He told the jury that Iqbal decided the girls were “ripe for sexual exploitation” and approached them.
The teenagers began talking to Iqbal and went to his home, where he called friends Badsha and Arshad.
The three men have been standing trial at Caernarfon Crown Court in Wales
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Once there, the girls were plied with drink and cannabis before being sexually assaulted, the court heard.
Mr Edwards told the jury: “They took the girls as sexual commodities.”
Singh is alleged to have arranged to take one of the girls to London.
He also instructed one of the girls to tell his sister that she was his 22-year-old carer, the court heard, so that his family would not suspect he was part of an “Asian grooming gang”.
The four men were arrested by Welsh police after the alarm was raised by one of the girl’s friends
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Police were contacted after a friend of one of the girls became concerned about her welfare.
All four men were subsequently arrested and made “various denials”, the court heard, though no charges were brought at that stage.
A third victim, a 16-year-old girl who was addicted to crack cocaine, was also exploited by Iqbal, who the court heard treated her as a “sex slave”.
Mr Edwards said Iqbal had “easy access” to drugs and utilised that access to control and exploit vulnerable girls.
He told the jury: “Each of these girls were vulnerable, each treated by older men as a sexual object, each provided with drugs.
“In every case, the person gaining from the relationship was the man.”
He added that the defendants “seemed proud of their exploits.”
Mr Edwards also said of Iqbal that he “routinely got his way by exploiting girls.”
Iqbal is separately alleged to have breached a slavery trafficking risk order.
A fifth defendant, Sarah Gray, 53, from Gronant, faces charges of conspiracy to supply cocaine and cannabis.
Gray is additionally accused of allowing her home to be used by Iqbal for the purposes of sexual exploitation.
She also faces a charge of perverting the course of justice by washing bedding following the rape of the 16-year-old girl, an assault that is alleged to have involved handcuffs.
Gray denies the allegations.
The trial continues and is being heard at Caernarfon Crown Court in Wales.