Spa ‘grope’ woman: I was having a laugh

SPA owner Kerry Brocklebank told a man she is accused of sexually assaulting she “was only trying to have a laugh” with him, a court heard yesterday.

Brocklebank, who allegedly groped him during an unwanted massage, also begged: “Please forgive me.”

Messages she sent to the alleged victim were revealed to jurors.

She dismissed the claim that the messages suggested there had been some “jokey banter” or flirting between her and the keen runner.

Brocklebank is accused of sexually assaulting the man at Huntingdon Spa, in Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire.

A qualified masseuse, she claims only to have touched the man’s calf muscles and denied rubbing his thighs or lower back.

Brocklebank, 43, said she suspected “something inappropriate” had been going on between the man and sports therapist Henry Godfree.

A £450 massage bed had been broken and handprints had been left around a treatment room, she told the court. Her messages to the client were meant “to smooth things over”.

She said: “I was trying to help, cover them for whatever was going on.”

She also denied perverting the course of justice by sending threatening messages to Mr Godfree, Cambridge Crown Court heard.

Brocklebank allegedly wrote: “Sorry, did I interrupt your gay time?” and “Believe me, if this goes to court I will ruin the pair of you.”

She told the jury: “I was informing him if he tries to tell lies about me, I will tell the truth and expose him.”

Mr Godfree denies he is gay. Brocklebank has accused the two men of concocting the allegation to win compensation from her.

Emma Rance, defending, said: “This is not some seedy massage parlour.”

Brocklebank, of Huntingdon, denies sexual assault, an alternative of common assault and perverting the course of justice.

The trial continues.