Pizza box woman got in my taxi, says rape trial soccer star

Port Vale defender Clayton McDonald, 23, and Wales and Sheffield United striker Ched Evans, also 23, deny the alleged attack on the 19-year-old complainant at a North Wales hotel in May last year.

The woman told police she has no memory of the incident and the prosecution says she was too drunk to consent to sexual intercourse.

Giving evidence at Caernarfon Crown Court, McDonald, of Marys Gate, Crewe, Cheshire, said he met the complainant in the street following a night out with childhood friend Evans, of Ashtree Gardens, Millhouse Green, Penistone, South Yorkshire.

He said Evans, whose mother lives in Rhyl, had invited him and others for a bank holiday night out in the seaside town on May 29.

But because there was not enough space at Evans’s mother’s house, the Sheffield United star had booked him into a Premier Inn hotel nearby.

After visiting a number of bars, the group ended up at a takeaway where there was a disturbance and McDonald, who described himself as “a little bit drunk”, decided to head for a taxi back to his hotel.

He said: “I got to a corner and turned around and saw a girl walk up to me.

“I said ‘Hiya, where are you going?’ and she said ‘Where are you going?’

“I said I was going to my hotel and she said ‘I’m coming with you’.”

Asked by Lloyd Morgan, defending, how the complainant appeared, the footballer said she was “walking fine”, holding a pizza box, and he was able to understand what she was saying.

“She was coming across very clear,” he added.

After flagging down a taxi, he said the woman got into the back of the car but the driver told her she could only have food in the front so she got out of the vehicle and moved into the front passenger seat and he sat in the back alone.

During the drive to the hotel, McDonald said he asked her name, where her friends were and if she had had a good night, and she replied to all his questions.

He also said he sent a text message to Evans saying he had “met a girl”.

At the hotel, he said they walked in “linking arms” and went to his room where they sat on the bed and she immediately began touching his genitals.

“I opened the door to room 14 and she walked in and put the pizza box on the side and sat on the bed,” she said.

“I sat next to her and that’s when she grabbed me.”

Asked by Mr Morgan if he had forced her to do anything, the defendant replied “No”.

“Was anything said between you?” the barrister asked.

McDonald replied: “No. I was in shock that she grabbed me, to be fair.”