Aristocrat 'sexually assaulted woman during his cocaine-fuelled party'

Scottish aristocrat ‘sexually assaulted a woman at stately home during his cocaine-fuelled 36th birthday party’, court hears

• Euan Tennant, 39, is alleged to have attacked the woman as the pair lay in bed with a second woman at Glen House near Innerleithen, Peeblesshire
• The woman, in her mid-20’s said she was invited to celebrate Tennant’s birthday
• The woman left the 20-bedroom mansion that morning and contacted the police

A Scots aristocrat sexually assaulted a woman during a drug-fuelled birthday party at his stately home, a court was told yesterday.

Euan Tennant, 39, is alleged to have attacked the woman as the pair lay in bed with a second woman at Glen House near Innerleithen, Peeblesshire.

The woman, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, told a jury at Edinburgh Sheriff Court yesterday how a naked Tennant began stroking her leg before going on to sexually assault her. He denies the alleged sex attack – claiming the contact between the pair was consensual.

The woman, who is in her mid-20s, gave her evidence from behind a screen. She said she had been invited by a female friend to attend a two-day event to celebrate Tennant’s 36th birthday. Her friend had been a close with the aristocrat since university but she had not met him before. She told how on the second evening the two women retired to their large bedroom along with Tennant. The three chatted for around 90 minutes and Tennant and the other woman took quantities of cocaine.

Euan Tennant, 39, is alleged to have attacked the woman as the pair lay in bed with a second woman at Glen House near Innerleithen, Peeblesshire

Tennant asked if he could spend the night, firstly by sleeping on top of the covers of the ‘huge four-poster bed’, but later taking his trousers off and getting into bed beside them.

The woman said she had ‘felt safe he would not do anything’. She told the jury: ‘I was facing [my friend] almost in a foetal position. Within a couple of minutes of us switching the lights off I could feel Euan’s finger touching my knee and stroking my knee.

‘I didn’t do anything hoping he would stop and take his hands away.’

He then moved his hand up to her leg. She added: ‘I was just thinking “What the hell is he doing?”. I didn’t say anything as I didn’t want [my friend] knowing what he was doing. It was quite intimate touching. I was being as still as possible and I wanted to pretend to be asleep hoping he would stop but he didn’t.’

The woman claimed he then touched her intimately over her underwear. She was ‘frozen’ in fear.

Her friend woke and went to the bathroom, leaving the two alone. She said Tennant told her: ‘I’m sorry if I offended you.’ The assault continued after her friend went back to sleep.

The woman claimed she later fled the bedroom in tears and subsequently told her friend what had happened. The pair left the 20-bedroom 19th century mansion in a taxi later that morning and she contacted the police.

Questioned by Tennant’s defence advocate, Victoria Young, the woman strenuously denied she had given consent to be touched sexually during the incident on July 27, 2019.

The trial in front of Sheriff Kenneth Campbell, QC, continues.

Tennant, who gives his occupation as an electrician and lives on the Glen estate, inherited the mansion in July 2018.

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