London student denies drugging and raping 10 women
Daniel Sandford
Home Affairs Correspondent, BBC News
Julia Quenzler
Zhenhao Zou, a Chinese PhD student, is accused of carrying out the offences between 2019 and 2024
A PhD student who was studying in the UK appears to be “a smart and charming young man” but is in fact “a persistent sexual predator, a voyeur and a rapist”, a jury has been told.
Zhenhao Zou, a Chinese national, is on trial at Inner London Crown Court accused of drugging and raping 10 women.
The substances alleged to be involved in the offences are MDMA, butanediol, ketamine and alprazolam, which is also known under the brand name Xanax.
The 27-year-old denies all 35 charges he faces including 11 counts of rape, three counts of voyeurism, 12 of possession of extreme pornography, one of false imprisonment and eight of possession of a controlled drug with intent to supply.
The court heard Mr Zhenhao, from Elephant and Castle in south London, first came to the UK from China in September 2017 to study at Queen’s University in Belfast and also studied for a master’s degree at University College London from 2019 through to 2021 before beginning a PhD at the same university.
Outlining the prosecution’s case, Catherine Farrelly KC said the accused was “a persistent sexual predator; a voyeur and a rapist”.
“To the outside world, he undoubtedly presents as a smart and charming young man,” Ms Farrelly told the court.
“The prosecution case at this trial is that he would meet women, he would stupefy them, either with drugs or with alcohol, and, once they were significantly under the influence of those drinks or drugs, he would then rape them.”
Julia Quenzler
Catherine Farrelly KC told jurors that several recordings would be shown during the trial – which she described as “the defendant’s souvenirs of many rapes”
Ms Farrelly explained to the jury several recordings would be shown during the trial, which the prosecution alleges were “the defendant’s souvenirs of many rapes that he had committed; items that he kept for his own private sexual gratification so that he could watch, at his leisure, his rapes of these women who he had rendered unconscious and totally vulnerable to his will”.
She added “most of the rapes in this case were only discovered by police after they had attended the defendant’s home address, searched it, seized various items from it and then examined them”.
Police have identified two of the alleged victims but not the remaining eight, the court was told.
It is claimed that there are video recordings relating to nine of the 10 alleged rape victims, for which Zou is charged with possessing extreme pornographic images. The jury heard there were also two other recordings in which the male involved cannot be identified.
The trial continues.
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