Nuclear sub base sailor ‘raped’ his date from Tinder
A ROYAL Navy sailor raped a colleague after inviting her to his room at a nuclear submarine base, a military court heard.
Able Seaman Joshua Powell is said to have slapped and spat in the woman’s face when she told him she wanted to stop having sex.
Prosecutors say the ‘aggressive’ electronic technician, 21, ignored her pleas. Powell is also accused of ‘giggling’ as he grabbed her crotch and breast a few weeks later at a boozy party.
He denies one count of rape and two sex assaults.
Powell, and the female sailor who cannot be named, were both stationed at HMNB Clyde, known as Faslane and the base for the Navy’s Submarine Service, including nuclear-armed subs which carry Trident missiles.
Prosecutor William Peters told Bulford Military Court, Wiltshire, that Powell and the woman met on dating app Tinder before he invited her to ‘chill out’ in his cabin, where he made plain there would be ‘limited preliminaries’.
Mr Peters said there was ‘some sexual activity’ before she ‘made her absence of consent plain’ by telling Powell to stop. He added: ‘Rather than complying with her request, he slapped her in the face repeatedly and told her to “take it”.’ The court heard she got dressed and left ‘feeling as if she had just had the worst experience ever’.
In evidence, the woman said she ‘withdrew my consent’ when he ‘asked me to do acts I wasn’t comfortable with’. In a police video interview shown to the court, she said Powell had been ‘persistent’ in his demands.
Detailing the party a few weeks later, she told the court ‘tipsy’ Powell was boasting
‘Boasting about having sex’
about them having had sex. He is alleged to have grabbed her crotch and then had his hand hit away when groping her breast, all of which he ‘seemed to find amusing’ by ‘giggling’.
In police interviews, Powell, who left the Navy in June 2023, said the intercourse was ‘consensual sex which she had not enjoyed’. He denied ‘anything remotely non- consensual’ had happened, and claimed the sexual assaults were ‘fabrications’.
The trial continues.