A wife raped by her husband and a string of other men was found with a ‘potentially fatal’ cocktail of 11 drugs in her system, a court heard today.
The woman believed the only tablets she took regularly were multivitamins and medication prescribed by her GP for high blood pressure, cholesterol and heartburn, Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court was told.
But, after her husband’s arrest in October 2025, she gave a hair sample for testing which revealed she had secretly received a ‘cocktail of stupefying drugs’, jurors heard.
They included morphine, cocaine, ketamine plus tranquilisers and sedatives.
Combined with alcohol, the effects were ‘unpredictable’ and ‘could have been fatal’ said prosecutor Louise Oakley KC.
Nine men are on trial at Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court accused of sexually abusing the woman at her home in Stockport. Four other men have already admitted to offences against her.
The husband, who is in his 60s and cannot be named to protect his wife's identity, has admitted raping his wife over a 20-year period, secretly giving her drugs after she had been drinking wine.
He shared images and footage of the abuse online in 2015 and, in 2023, started inviting men he had met online to the couple’s four-bedroom home, the court was told.
Eight of the nine accused, clockwise from top left, Philip Wild, Jordan Wallace, Robert Stewart, Jonathan Kirk, Richard Townsend, Alan Keelan, Mohammed Sabir and David Graves
The abuse continued until October last year when undercover journalists infiltrated online messaging groups where footage was being shared and contacted police.
Ms Oakley said an eight-centimetre strand of hair was taken from the wife and sent to a specialist laboratory in France.
She said: ‘Hair analysis can provide a historical timeline of exposure spanning weeks, months or even up to a year depending on the length of a person’s hair. Such analysis can therefore detect long term exposure to drugs and other prescription medications.’
The tests found presence of 11 drugs: morphine, ketamine, cocaine and a by-product, plus a range of antidepressant and hay fever drugs with sedative properties, along with tranquilisers including diazepam and zolpidem.
Ms Oakley said: ‘None of the drugs or medications detected in her hair had been prescribed to her.
‘Mixed with alcohol the risk of severe sedation increases and could even be fatal.’
The barrister told jurors that the husband’s use of drugs on his wife had been ‘evident not only from his online discussions but also his internet browsing history’.
She said: ‘Between October 2014 and October 2025, his internet browsing history reveals extensive searches for medication / drugs (prescription or otherwise, and various illegal drugs), including their effects, dosage, purchasing (and) the dangers of mixing with alcohol.’
Mohammed Sabir, 29, was allegedly one of two men who raped the woman in a single night in September 2025
Robert Stewart, 70, is accused of raping the wife the same night as Sabir in September 2025
Ms Oakley said the husband ‘may have also sourced and purchased other ‘sleeping serums’ where the chemical composition is unknown’.
A police search of the couple’s home revealed plastic pipettes from the drawer of a bedside table, one of which had ‘a white powder inside found to be zolpidem’, plus blister packs of viagra, zolpidem and diazepam.
Jurors were told the results of the test were likely to be an ‘underestimate’ because the woman had her hair dyed every five weeks, which can ‘remove evidence’.
The court has also heard the husband discussed drugs with co-defendant David Graves, 60, who agreed to post some to his mother-in-law’s home soon after she died and the house was empty. Graves allegedly sent the husband an unknown type of sedative and also messaged the husband about use of GHB.
The husband is also said to have discussed use of drugs as far back as 2016 with Robert Stewart, 70, one of two men who allegedly raped the unconscious woman in a single night on September 21 last year – a month before the husband’s arrest.
The alleged visit by Stewart and another defendant Mohammed Sabir, 29, was the fourth occasion that men turned up at the house one after another in a single night, jurors were told.
After the September 21 visit, jurors heard Stewart contacted the husband via a message urging him to ‘delete all images’ and saying ‘remember what happened to the guy in France?’ a reference to Gisèle Pelicot, who was raped by her husband.
Ms Oakley said: ‘His comparison of what happened to her and his conduct perhaps sums up this entire case from start to finish.’
The court heard that even after the husband’s arrest on October 23, he continued to receive messages from co-defendants.
Daniel Rayner tried to contact him two days later asking if there were ‘any plans to abuse her this weekend mate’ – and messaging again a week later.
Jonathan Kirk is accused of two rapes against the unconscious woman in August 2025
Kirk arriving at Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court earlier this week for ongoing trial
The court heard that after being drugged and raped in the early hours of September 21, the wife did not wake until early the following afternoon and messaged a female friend saying she felt ‘wobbly, woozy and a bit weird’.
Ms Oakley said the woman initially replied to a message from the friend, part of a group the wife had been drinking with the previous evening, just after 1pm.
She then went back to sleep, the court heard, before texting another friend three hours later saying she was ‘still in my PJs, feeling weird but not hungover… just weird’.
Meanwhile, in secret conversations with other alleged offenders, the husband described his wife as having been ‘used like a sex doll’.
After the husband’s eventual guilty pleas, Ms Oakley said he was now giving evidence for the prosecution.
She said: ‘He says he wants to tell the truth. He wants his wife and (children) to know the truth.
‘He is not doing it to get a reduced sentence. He fully expects to die in prison for what he has done.
‘He accepts that what he did was down to him, that he was the one in control. Without him, none of it would have happened.’
Concluding her opening of the prosecution case, Ms Oakley said the offenders had been ‘caught with their trousers down quite literally’.
She said: ‘It wasn’t a game, it wasn’t fantasy role play, it wasn’t unconventional consensual sexual practises; it was men practising their barbaric fantasies on a completely unaware victim.’
Wallace donned sunglasses as he arrived at the court in Manchester earlier this week
Married father-of-two Alan Keelan, 42, pictured at a football club awards presentation
On trial are David Graves, 60, a sales rep; Jonathan Kirk, 43, a senior paramedic; Robert Stewart, 70, a retired DJ; Mohammed Sabir, 29, a recruitment consultant; youth football coach Alan Keelan, 42; building company worker and dog walker Jordan Wallace, 31; taxi driver Philip Wild, 58; metal worker Richard Townsend, 38; and Daniel Rayner, 42, a self-employed mechanic.
All deny a variety of sexual offences.
In September, the woman's husband of 40 years admitted 62 charges including multiple rapes, jurors were told.
Opening the trial on Monday, Ms Oakley said Stewart sent a message to the husband after he visited the house, urging him to 'delete all images' and saying 'remember what happened to the guy in France.'
Father-of-three Philip Wild, 58, Stockport, is accused of attempted rape and sexual assault
David Graves, 60, denies conspiracy to commit rape, sexual assault and administer drugs
Richard Townsend, 38,is accused of sexually assaulting the woman in her bed
He wrote: 'Mate, have had a bad feeling about it all day. Delete all images from your phone etc as it's too risky. Remember what happened to the guy in France.
'Delete me from your phone and life. If she caught you out it would be a whole lot of trouble and end your marriage and ruin your life.'
'The reference in the message related to the man in France who had been raping his wife, a lady by the name of Gisèle Pelicot,' Ms Oakley said.
Stewart, Wild, Sabir and Kirk, all of Stockport, Greater Manchester, Graves, of Ilkeston, Derbyshire, and Rayner, of Whitstable, Kent, deny conspiracy to rape between 2015 and 2025.
Former Taunton Town Football Club CEO Karl Lindsay, 56, has admitted conspiracy charges
Graham Brougham, 74, is the oldest of 14 defendants charged over the attacks
Keith Fotheringham, 59, has admitted abusing the wife and involvement in conspiracy charges
Sean Peers, 38,has pleaded guilty to a sexual assault against the wife at an earlier hearing
Graves and Rayner also deny conspiracy to assault by penetration between 2018 and 2025, while Stewart, Graves and Rayner deny conspiracy to administer a substance 'with the intention of stupefying or overpowering' the wife between 2015 and 2025.
Wild is also charged with sexual assault in August 2023, plus attempted rape and assault by penetration in February 2025. Sabir denies three rapes, in February 2025 and twice in September 2025.
Wallace, of Stockport, denies rape and attempted rape in May 2025, Keelan, from Manchester, denies two attempted rapes and an assault by penetration, all in June 2025.
Townsend, of Heywood, Greater Manchester, denies assault by penetration in July 2025, while Kirk denies two rapes in August 2025. Stewart denies two rapes in September 2025.
Four other men – Karl Lindsay, 56, of Taunton, Somerset, Graham Brougham, 74, of Northwich, Cheshire, Keith Fotheringham, 59, of Dundee, and Sean Peers, 38, of Stockport – have also pleaded guilty to various sexual offences at earlier hearings.
The trial, which is expected to take at least two months, continues.