Judge Condemns Pair Who Drugged and Raped Vulnerable Underage Girls Before Moving on to ‘Fresh Meat’

Two men have today been jailed for drugging and raping vulnerable underage girls they found walking the streets.

Shazad Rehman, 30, was jailed for 18-and-half years and his nephew Bilal Hussain, 23, was jailed for 17-and-a-half years at Bradford Crown Court.

Judge Jonathan Rose said the men ‘engaged in a course of conduct which has become increasingly and depressingly familiar in this country’.

The pair denied abusing the girls, who were picked up as they cruised the streets of Keighley and Halifax, West Yorkshire.

A jury of eight men and two women found them guilty of a series of sex and drugs offences after two days of deliberation.

The court heard how Rehman and Hussain – known as ‘Yaz and Naz’ – plied the girls with alcohol and cannabis and took them to hotels for sex.

One 14-year-old girl said she felt ashamed, dirty and worthless after she was drugged and raped.

Miss Colborne QC said Rehman boasted his victims were ‘fresh meat’.

She said: ‘They acted together, travelling from their various home addresses in Leeds and Halifax to Keighley town centre where they specifically targeted vulnerable girls, all underage.

‘She said some of the girls, none of whom can be identified, had difficult backgrounds or were emotionally fragile and may have been seeking attention.

‘They were out of their depth,’ the jury was told.

‘They were supplied with strong alcohol and cannabis, enticed to believe they would have fun, that they were special.

‘In truth what was on offer was beyond their control.’

The trial heard that one of the girls, who was 14 when the attacks happened in 2010 and 2011, was repeatedly raped.

Prosecutors told the jury that the men acted together and deliberately went out to target vulnerable victims, who had problems and were looking for attention.

The men, who mainly targeted the Keighley area, used the Alder House Hotel in Batley and the Campanile Hotel in Bradford.

Judge Rose told Rehman and Hussain: ‘It is conduct which is pernicious, wicked and determined.

‘It involved the deliberate targeting of young girls – girls who were already damaged, girls who were already very vulnerable, girls who were immature and seeking, perhaps, adventure, companionship, affection and even love.

‘You two appeared in your fancy cars, with money to spend, compliments to pay and with alcohol and drugs to entice these girls into those cars and to take them somewhere private and hidden, there to sexually violate, abuse and degrade those girls until, bored, you sought what you, Shazad Rehman, described as ‘fresh meat, untouched and with no reputation’.

‘I have no shadow of doubt that you have caused incalculable psychological harm to your victims.’

He went on: ‘Neither of you lived in Keighley but you identified that town as a place where you would easily find children who, unhappy at home and at school, would be easily persuaded to come with you for what they believed would be a fun and good time but was in fact nothing more than sordid sexual abuse.’

Rehman, of no fixed address, was found guilty of raping two girls, sexual activity with one of the same girls and sexually assaulting two different girls.

Hussain, of Leeds, was found guilty of raping two girls and also of assaulting one of his victims.

Both men were also convicted of a series of drugs offences and a charge of conspiring to intimidate a witness.

Neither opted to give evidence during the trial, which lasted a number of weeks.