A British Hollywood actress accused of sexually abusing a 13-year-old schoolgirl threatened to burn the victim’s belongings for leaving her, a court heard.
Zara Phythian, who started in Doctor Strange, is accused of 14 charges of sexual activity with a child alongside her husband, taekwondo ‘master‘ Victor Marke.
Nottingham Crown Court heard evidence from the alleged victim, who cannot be named for legal reasons, for the first time today.
Speaking from behind a screen, the girl – now a grown-up – said she had planned to ‘die with my shame’.
According to the testimony, she confronted Phythian, who played the character of Brunette Zealot alongside Benedict Cumberbatch, at the age of 18.
‘I said I am not coming back,’ she recalled, fighting back tears. ‘Zara said “Don’t come back, I’m burning all your stuff”.’
Jurors were told the abuse happened between 2005 and 2008 when she was between 13 and 15 years old. But the couple deny all of the offences.
Phythian and Marke, who were not married at the time, are also accused of filming most of the sex acts to recreate pornographic scenes.
Recently, the alleged victim become a mother herself, and felt she had ‘no option but to speak my truth’ to stop anyone else being abused by them, the Daily Mail reported.
‘That was my deepest, darkest secret,’ the woman said. ‘I thought that if I was to say anything, then my family would hate me.
‘At that time I really hated my mum. I got stuck because I had this secret and I could not tell her.’
In an earlier videotaped interview played to the jury that the alleged victim gave to police, she told how the Markes ‘preyed’ upon her.
She said: ‘They saw the vulnerability in me and preyed on that, and saw my mum was struggling, and took advantage of that.
‘I found it quite hard and they kind of instructed me through all of it [the sexual activity]’.’
Referring to the alleged filming of the incidents, she added: ‘All I can remember is he used to record.
‘I don’t know what he did with them. I never saw them again. I did not want to see them. I was ashamed. It was a power they had over me.’
Marke faces four further allegations, all denied, of historic indecent assault on another teenage girl.
This alleged victim told police she was ‘groomed and sexually touched’ by the man, who was many years her senior.
She told police he touched her, kissed her face, and had sex with her when she turned 16. ‘I’d never done anything like that at all,’ she told officers.
Ahmed Hossain QC, prosecuting, had told the jury as he outlined the case: ‘Both of those defendants commanded admiration and respect within the martial arts world.
‘The prosecution case is that Marke groomed the two separate complainants when they were children and that he used his position of trust and authority to make them feel special so that he could satisfy his sexual urges.
‘And, it is the prosecution’s case, that Zara Marke was part of that process and Zara Marke acted, as is alleged, with Victor Marke.’
The trial continues.
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