Chapter 5: September–November 2017
316.This chapter deals with Ms Zaman’s first visit to Lord Ahmed’s house in September 2017, when their sexual relationship began, until it ended in November 2017. The matters covered here are:
- how the sexual relationship began;
- Ms Zaman’s allegation that Lord Ahmed spiked her tea; and
- the basis of the ongoing relationship.
How the sexual relationship began
Evidence
317.In her police interview of 26 April 2018, Ms Zaman said that when she went to Lord Ahmed’s house, after they had had tea and something to eat, he made advances to her, sitting on her lap and telling her he was sexually aroused. She pushed him off, saying ‘What are you doing? I’m not ready,’ but he kept on saying how much he liked her and she thought perhaps he really did. He suggested they went upstairs, so they did and they then went into his bedroom and had sexual intercourse. She said that she was laughing while they took their clothes off:
“we had intercourse and I was supposed to ask about, you know, the follow-up with the Commissioner and if he had written back. I totally, you know, forgot, and I was like, ‘Wow, what happened then?’”
318.She thought that what had happened meant that he really did love her.
319.She said that he had not forced her to have sex with him, but nor had she been expecting that they were going to have sex the first time that she went to his house, “but it happened”.
320.Ms Zaman set out her account of the evening in an email to the investigating police officer on 13 June 2018:
“I never thought about my first visit to Lord Ahmed’s house until my sister … started asking me, “how did you end up having sex with Lord Ahmed? How did it lead to that?” Given that this incident was out of character for me.
My sister … started questioning me in detail as to what had happened at Lord Ahmed’s house. It was through this I recalled that I was running late and Lord Ahmed was not happy and kept ringing and texting me to ask how long I would be. He wanted to know the exact time I was going to arrive his house. When I arrived, Lord Ahmed had the tea ready for me and after taking a sip I noticed the tea tasted slightly odd. I remember asking Lord Ahmed if the milk in the tea was ‘off’, to which he replied “no it’s not off, my tea tastes fine”. I didn’t think much of this at that time.
After having half cup I didn’t want anymore and I stopped drinking the tea, then all of a sudden Lord came on to me and tried sitting on my lap and wanting to kiss me. I pushed him away and stated that you are hurting me and that we haven’t known each other for that long. He apologised and moved back and asked me to finish my tea.
After I had finished drinking the tea, Lord Ahmed was very adamant to show me around his house. We went upstairs and Lord Ahmed showed the first room, which was his ironing room and did not have a bed in there. He then took me to next room which he stated was a guest bedroom which had an en-suite. Lastly he took me to his bedroom and was showing off how his house was well maintained for example his clothes were washed, ironed and dry cleaned. All his towels were washed ironed and folded ready for use.
Lord Ahmed started coming closer towards me at the same time he was removing his clothing. I started giggling and as he was coming close to me and I was moving backwards trying to get away from him and all of a sudden I fell on my back on the bed. Whilst still laughing loudly then Lord Ahmed told me not to make any noise as he has tenants next door.
We ended up having intercourse and when we finished I was really tired and sleepy. I couldn’t understand why I’m I falling asleep. I did say to Lord Ahmed that I’m feeling tired and sleepy and he stated that “why don’t you stay the night”. I was worried about my children and wanted to go home as I also had work the next day. I got out off the bed and went to the bathroom which was attached to his bedroom and put my clothes on. When I got out of the bathroom, Lord Ahmed had left the bedroom and was down stairs but not in the living room. I waited for him in the living room and was very confused to what had happened. When Lord Ahmed came in to living room I said to him I must leave now and said good bye to him.
When I got home Lord Ahmed messaged me saying it was really nice to see me and good night.
The next day I received texts messages from Lord Ahmed telling me that I needed to go on the pill and we both need to be careful, otherwise you will end up getting pregnant.”
321.She gave a similar account in her police interviews on 11 July 2018 and in her undated response to Lord Ahmed’s statement of 26 July 2019. These were also consistent with the account reported by Newsnight:
“U: Lord Ahmed’s main home is in Rotherham but he owns property in the capital. He asked Tahira to discuss her case at his house on this street in east London. When she arrived, he offered her a cup of tea.
Ms Zaman: He was saying, you know just saying I am beautiful and he really likes me and then, all of a sudden, he came and sat on top of me.
U: How did that happen? Was this downstairs still?
Ms Zaman: Yes, on the sofa and I’m saying, “What are you doing? You’re hurting me”, and he said, “Okay, okay, I’m sorry”, and I’m thinking what am I getting myself into? And I was just like really, you know, it’s just so difficult, [U], when you are in a situation and you try to come out of that situation, it is difficult, and when you need somebody’s help.
U: She says she felt pressure to go further and felt uncomfortable, but later that evening she did have sex with him. He continued to pursue her and Tahira did feel they were entering into a relationship. They messaged each other frequently. She says that they continued to meet at Lord Ahmed’s house, where they had sex. But Tahira says that after two months he made it clear he wasn’t going to leave his wife and the affair ended.
U: It was, I suppose, a consensual sexual relationship.
Ms Zaman: I thought that it has happened now, and after that because I believed that he I genuinely did believe that he had feelings for me. Just, I’m so stupid and I believed he had feelings for me and I believed that he was going to help me.”
322.In her timeline she put:
“September/October 2017: I was still waiting for an update, then Lord Ahmed asked me to meet with him for dinner. I agreed as I wanted him to help me and I went to see him at his house one evening at [address]. Lord Ahmed came onto me first, by coming closer to kiss me and I pushed him away saying I am not ready. Then 15 to 20 minutes later we kissed and the relationship started from there and he had intercourse with me in his bedroom.”
323.In her interview with us on 6 August 2019 she confirmed that the sexual relationship began the first time she went to his house.
324.On 19 December 2019 I emailed Ms Zaman to ask her what she had meant when she said, in her police interview, that, when Lord Ahmed sat on her legs she had said ‘I’m not ready’. She replied the same day, saying she couldn’t remember saying this, but what she had meant was that she was not ready for a new relationship as she was still recovering from her relationship with J.
325.During his police interview in July 2018 Lord Ahmed said that Ms Zaman came to his house and brought food. After they had eaten, she held his hand and said she liked him, and asked him why he was not interested in her, and they ended up in the bedroom, having sex:
“She then started talking—“I like you”—and sort of giving the impression, held my hand, and then started saying, “Why—. Is there something wrong? Is there something wrong? Why are you not interested?” And then, from one thing or another, we agreed, which I admit is my weakness, and I, you know, displayed weakness and I’m, you know, that I agreed, and I said, “Okay. We can’t do it here. We’ll go upstairs, in my bedroom”.”
326.In his police interview he spontaneously mentioned that he took Levitra, a treatment for erectile dysfunction. I wrote to him on 12 December 2019 with various queries about his police interview, and asked him to clarify why he mentioned this to the police in the context of his involvement with Ms Zaman. He replied, “Levitra is for my stimulation and I was making the point that I could not cope with her demands”.
327.In his written response of 23 July 2019 to Ms Zaman’s complaint he did not mention having started a sexual relationship when they met at his house.
328.In his interview on 13 August 2019 he said that when they met “one thing or another led to this [the start of their sexual relationship]” and:
“She came to my house, she brought some food and I went to make tea. We put the food on the table, I brought some plates. I don’t think she had much food. I had some food. We had tea and from one thing to another led to the whatever.
The Commissioner for Standards: Okay. So there was nothing about you coming on to her?
Lord Ahmed: No, no, absolutely I wouldn’t.
The Commissioner for Standards: So who made the first move?
Lord Ahmed: She not only made the first move, she was complimenting and—yeah.”
329.Lord Ahmed also sent me a letter from the BBC, dated 6 February 2019 ahead of their Newsnight broadcast, which included:
“Tahira says you asked her to meet at your house in [address] for dinner to discuss the Met’s reply and her case. She agreed to this. She says that when you were in the house with her you said she was beautiful and then suddenly sat on top of her on the sofa downstairs. She says she felt-pressured and extremely uncomfortable. Later that evening, you had sexual Intercourse with her upstairs. We accept this was consensual, but what is your comment about the appropriateness of this, given that you knew Tahira was a vulnerable member of the public who had come to you for help?”
Analysis
330.I have already found that it is more likely than not that Ms Zaman went to Lord Ahmed’s house at his invitation to discuss the offer made by the police to meet her. Lord Ahmed denied that this was the purpose of the meeting, but his evidence was inconsistent, implausible and unconvincing.
331.On three occasions in 2018: when Ms Zaman was interviewed by the police in April; when she produced her timeline; and when she emailed the police on 13 June 2017; she said that she had protested when Lord Ahmed sat on her legs. In June 2018 she said that she had told Lord Ahmed they had not known each other for long. On the other two occasions she said she had said to him that she was not ready, and when we asked her what she meant, she told us that she was saying she was not ready for another relationship. These accounts were consistent and convincing.
332.It is clear that Ms Zaman did not get the help she had been led to believe would be given at the meeting, and it seems likely that the actual outcome of the evening was something that Lord Ahmed had hoped for and tried to organise.
333.Ms Zaman pointed out that she knew from her relationship with Lord Ahmed that he took Levitra, and indeed Lord Ahmed confirmed this. It is not possible to know if Lord Ahmed used Levitra on this occasion, but her description of his impatience for her to arrive and his sexual arousal when he sat on her lap, suggests that he may have done, and that the encounter was pre-planned.
Finding
334.I find it is more likely than not that Lord Ahmed planned and initiated the sexual encounter at his home the first time they met there. He used the excuse of helping Ms Zaman with her complaint as a device to get her to his house.
Ms Zaman’s allegation that Lord Ahmed spiked her tea
Evidence
335.Ms Zaman says that she believes Lord Ahmed may have spiked the cup of tea he gave her with a date rape drug, as she felt peculiar that evening, behaved in a way that was out of character (having sex with someone who she had only met twice before, who was much older than her, who she was not sexually attracted to, and who was meant to be helping her professionally), and felt ill in the following days.
336.The first mention of her belief that she had been drugged appears to have been in a phone call she had with the investigating officer on 30 May 2018, referred to in her subsequent email of 13 June 2018, in which she described the meeting at Lord Ahmed’s house:
“When I arrived, Lord Ahmed had the tea ready for me and after taking a sip I noticed the tea tasted slightly odd. I remember asking Lord Ahmed if the milk in the tea was ‘off’, to which he replied “no it’s not off, my tea tastes fine”. I didn’t think much of this at that time.”
337.She described feeling unusually tired at the time and, later, unable to adequately explain why she had had sex with Lord Ahmed. She went on to say:
“I don’t have any proof that Lord Ahmed had put something in my tea but, I do feel there is a possibility that he may have done this. I never had a reason to doubt Lord Ahmed’s character and never imagined that something like this could happen to me. … As the tea was pre-made I have no idea of the contents of the tea and do doubt what was in the tea, given how I felt when I fell on the bed and after the encounter.”
338.In her police interview on 11 July 2018 she explained that she thought she might have been drugged because she felt strange that evening and was subsequently ill. She also felt that her behaviour was completely out of character that evening.
339.Ms Zaman did not mention the possibility of having been drugged in the draft complaint of 20 January 2018 or her formal complaint of 28 January 2018, nor did she mention it in the letter she circulated to parliamentarians at the end of March 2018, nor in the timeline she sent to the police in April 2018. However she made the allegation in her response to Lord Ahmed’s statement of 23 July 2019, and in her interview on 6 August 2019.
340.During her police interview on 11 July 2018, the interviewing officer asked her if the sexual intercourse was consensual. Ms Zaman said that he hadn’t forced her to have sexual intercourse, but he had been demanding and she found herself complying:
“I don’t know how it happened. I was in bed. It was not that he was beating me up or forcing me. He was in control. He was telling me what to do and I was just—I didn’t know what to do. I just—I don’t know, I didn’t know what to do to be honest with you. I didn’t know what to do.”
341.After her interview with us on 6 August 2019 Ms Zaman provided an extract from her GP’s notes from that time:
342.Lord Ahmed has always denied spiking Ms Zaman’s drink. He was told about the allegation in the disclosure document given to him by the police before his interview on 26 July 2018. In that interview he addressed the allegation saying, “[a]nd all this nonsense that I put something in the tea. I wouldn’t even know where to begin.”
343.Lord Ahmed also addressed this allegation in his written response to me on 23 July 2019:
“One further point is that in the disclosure given to me by the police Ms Zaman gave the distinct impression that she had been drugged by me (by her consuming a ‘pre-made drink and alleges something may have been put in this drink as it made her incredibly sleepy’) and subsequently forced to have sex with me in this condition, which clearly amounts to rape. In stark contrast to this very serious allegation to law enforcement officers, she told the BBC Newsnight programme in February 2019 that the sex with me was consensual.”
344.In our interview on 13 August 2019, Lord Ahmed also provided a clear denial of the allegation:
“it is completely false and nonsense. I wouldn’t even know what to do. I don’t drink alcohol, I’ve never had alcohol. I did offer her a cup of tea. She had a cup of tea. Because she brought the food, I made the tea and there was absolutely nothing in there.”
Analysis
345.Ms Zaman did not suspect having been drugged until after the end of her involvement with X, which was nearly four months after the suspected drugging. This in itself is not particularly strange: when things go wrong between people a process of re-evaluation of earlier events will often take place, which can lead to a different understanding of those earlier events. However, a subsequent belief to explain earlier events is almost impossible to prove without other evidence, and the only other evidence here—the GP record—is not conclusive. Being drugged is one explanation for her subsequent illness, but it is also possible that her unusual feelings and behaviour at Lord Ahmed’s house arose from the early symptoms of the episode of illness that subsequently manifested itself.
346.Ms Zaman herself, when talking to us and to the police, made it clear that she did not know if her beliefs were correct.
347.Lord Ahmed’s denials have been consistent each time the allegation has been raised with him.
Finding
348.The balance of probability requires evidence that a particular event was more likely than not to have occurred. In the light of Lord Ahmed’s consistent denials, Ms Zaman’s own uncertainty, and the lack of any contemporaneous and corroborative evidence, it is not possible to conclude that one account is more likely to be accurate than the other.
349.I therefore do not uphold the complaint that Lord Ahmed drugged Ms Zaman when she went to his house in September 2017.
The basis of their relationship until it ended in November 2017
Evidence
350.Ms Zaman acknowledges that she believed Lord Ahmed loved her, and that she developed feelings for him, and this is borne out in some of her WhatsApp messages to X. However, she also says that during their relationship she continued to press for a meeting with the police to be arranged, as offered in the police letter of 3 May 2017, and that Lord Ahmed continued to say that he would arrange this. She made this point in her email to the police on 28 April 2018; her email to me of 5 June 2019; her response to Lord Ahmed’s statement of 23 July 2019; and in her interview on 6 August 2019.
351.The thousands of WhatsApp messages between Ms Zaman and X make no mention of Ms Zaman’s complaint against S or her claim that Lord Ahmed had promised to arrange for Ms Zaman to see the police about her complaint. In December 2019 I asked her why this was.
352.On 12 December 2019 she wrote and explained that she did not consider X a friend to begin with and was only communicating with him because Lord Ahmed wanted her to, and she feared “a backlash” if she did not do so. After Lord Ahmed forced her to talk to X on video phone, X started immediately pursuing her for a romantic relationship. She had no reason to talk to X about the help Lord Ahmed had offered, as there was nothing X could do to help and he was insistent that Lord Ahmed should not know how frequently they were messaging.
353.As set out in his statements and interview on 13 August 2019 Lord Ahmed says that the work he had done as a parliamentarian was over in March 2017, and was never an issue during their sexual relationship.
354.In his undated statement received in my office on 13 March 2020 Lord Ahmed asked why, if she had received the letter of 3 May 2017 from the police, she did not contact the author of the letter to follow up the offer of a meeting. He pointed out that she had no difficulty in writing to the Prime Minister in September 2017, and suggested that the fact that she didn’t respond to the author of the letter of 3 May 2017 showed that the offer of a meeting with the police was not a factor in their relationship from September to November 2017.
Analysis
355.If Ms Zaman was still pursuing her complaint against S, and if she believed Lord Ahmed was trying to help her with this, it seems likely that she would continue to raise the matter with Lord Ahmed during their sexual relationship.
356.We know that Ms Zaman was pursuing the complaint more widely, as she wrote to Theresa May on 30 September 2017, after her relationship with Lord Ahmed had started. We wrote to Ms Zaman in December 2019 asking why she had done this. She replied:
“I was reaching out to everyone else because I felt the police was not responding to my complaint of [S], and how he targets and exploits vulnerable women. I was seeking help and aid in the investigation of [S] … I simply wanted help from anyone willing to offer it to me—whether it was the Prime Minister or Commissioner Cressida Dick. I did feel uncomfortable with Lord Ahmed’s ‘romantic attention’.”
357.The fact that she found the reply disappointing, as shown in her timeline, suggests that she would still be keen to take forward Lord Ahmed’s offer to help arrange a meeting with the police, as her own efforts had not led to success. The letter from the police to Lord Ahmed was far more promising than the reply to her letter to the Prime Minister. It is clear from her evidence that she interpreted the letter of 3 May 2017 as an offer for her and Lord Ahmed to meet Commissioner Dick or someone from her office, which would have been a significant improvement on what she had so far achieved for herself.
358.I consider her explanation for not discussing with X her complaint against S or Lord Ahmed’s promise to arrange a meeting with the police to be reasonable. I have read all the WhatsApp exchanges between X and Ms Zaman, retrieved from her phone, and consider that she was remarkably discreet about Lord Ahmed, only rarely using his name, otherwise referring to him as “her friend” and only mentioning her sexual relationship with him briefly, infrequently, obliquely, and when X had made it a matter of trust that she should answer his questions.
359.The WhatsApp messages between Lord Ahmed and Ms Zaman could have put the matter beyond doubt: if there had been no mention of the possible meeting or of the letter from the police, this would be strong evidence that such a meeting was not a factor in their relationship. However, as explained below, all the messages between Lord Ahmed and Ms Zaman were deleted by X or at X’s behest in December 2017 and could not be recovered by Ms Zaman using Dr Fone and were not available from Lord Ahmed.
360.In the absence of any direct corroborative evidence on this point, it is relevant to look at Lord Ahmed’s conduct during the investigation. This has been to do everything possible to distance himself from any suggestion that the letter from the police was a factor in his relationship with Ms Zaman over the autumn of 2017, to the extent that in November 2019 he said to us that he had not contacted her about the letter, despite having previously said the opposite to the police in 2018 and to us in July and August 2019. However, we know that she received the letter, which can only have come from him, and we know that this must have been after her text to him of 14 July 2017. We also know that she wrote to the Prime Minister at the end of September, and that she complained to the police about S in 2016. I have also found it more likely than not that Lord Ahmed persuaded her to come to his house in September by saying that he wanted to discuss the possible meeting with the police.
361.In these circumstances, it seems highly unlikely that Ms Zaman would have given up her quest as soon as she started her sexual relationship with Lord Ahmed, and it seems very likely that, if she continued to raise the matter, he would have told her that the matter was still in hand. The fact that he lived both in London and Rotherham, was a busy public figure and also travelled abroad during this time, would explain the delay in making the arrangements, and, indeed Ms Zaman confirmed that this is what he told her.
362.With regard to Lord Ahmed’s question of why Ms Zaman did not follow up the reply from the police herself this has to be considered in context. While they were in a relationship Ms Zaman had placed her trust in Lord Ahmed, a member of the House of Lords who had agreed to help her and who had shown her copies of correspondence between himself and the Metropolitan Police demonstrating the actions he had taken. She believed the reply from the police offered a meeting, to which Lord Ahmed would accompany her, at which her complaint against S would be discussed. As Lord Ahmed had not advised her that he had ceased to act on her behalf in the matter it was natural for her to continue to believe he was helping her and that his intervention as an authority figure would result in action. She had written to the Prime Minister in the hope of a positive response, in the early stages of her relationship with Lord Ahmed and at a time when Lord Ahmed had not yet arranged the meeting as promised, but had been disappointed in the reply, and it was reasonable that she would feel that Lord Ahmed’s continued involvement was necessary to the success of her attempts to get justice.
Finding
363.I therefore find that it is more likely than not that Lord Ahmed continued to offer to arrange a meeting with the police between September and November 2017, and was holding himself out to be engaged in parliamentary activities during their sexual relationship.