An asylum seeker asked a 14-year-old girl if she wanted to go to the Bell Hotel “to have babies then… go to Kenya”, a court heard. The trial of Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu, 38, has entered its second day, where a 14-year-old boy said an asylum seeker hotel resident asked his female friends for a kiss. The boy said, in a police video interview played at Colchester Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday, that he was with friends, including the 14-year-old girl, when the man asked them for a slice of their pizza in Epping, Essex.
The boy said they gave the man the food on July 7 this year and then the man “asked to have babies with (the 14-year-old girl) and this other girl, then he asked for a kiss from both of them”. The boy said: “He just said they’re pretty and he also said do you want to come to the Bell Hotel to have babies then we could go to Kenya with each other.”
Kebatu, who gave his date of birth as December 1986, making him 38 years old, denies five charges, including sexual assault. The trial, now on its second day, continues.
The migrant, who had arrived in the UK by small boat across the English Channel just eight days earlier, allegedly made inappropriate comments to the teenager and her friend “without any encouragement” shortly after approaching the children on July 7 in the Essex town.
Chelmsford Magistrates’ Court was told he pouted his lips towards the girls and had an erection as he told the two children “he wanted to have a baby with each of them” before inviting them back to his bedroom. Stuart Cowen, prosecuting, said Kebatu’s “advances” were rejected by the shocked 14-year-olds.
Mr Cowen told the court the case has “attracted quite a lot of publicity because of the defendant’s personal circumstances” – with the alleged incidents sparking protests and counter-protests outside the former Bell Hotel in Epping, Essex.
Similar protests have subsequently erupted outside hotels across the country housing asylum seekers.
Somani Hotels Limited, which owns the Bell property, is currently subject to a temporary injunction won by Epping Forest District Council, who claim they failed to get planning permission for a change of use prior to housing refugees.
The firm will have its bid to appeal against a ruling that it cannot house asylum seekers at the site heard by the Court of Appeal on Thursday.
The trial continues.