Child abuse trial of ex-peer Nazir Ahmed reinstated by Court of Appeal

LONDON: Former peer Nazir Ahmed will face trial over allegations of child sex abuse after the Court of Appeal ruled criminal proceedings against him should continue.

Ahmed, a former Labour peer who was Lord Ahmed of Rotherham before he resigned from the House of Lords last year, went on trial at Sheffield Crown Court earlier this year accused of sexually abusing a younger boy and girl when he was a teenager in the early 1970s. Judge Jeremy Richardson QC halted the trial in February and stayed the case as an abuse of process the following month, but on Wednesday the Court of Appeal announced that it had overturned that ruling. At a brief hearing at the Royal Courts of Justice in London, Lord Justice Fulford said: “The case will now be retried at a future date in the crown court.”

The judge added: “These proceedings should continue before a different judge.”

Ahmed, 64, was charged with two counts of attempting to rape a girl under 16, indecent assault of a boy under 14 and raping a boy under 16, all said to have occurred in the early 1970s.

His brothers Mohammed Farouq and Mohammed Tariq were accused of indecent assault of a boy under 14, but were deemed unfit to plead and faced a trial of the facts during the previous criminal proceedings. Announcing the court’s decision to reinstate the criminal proceedings, Lord Justice Fulford said: “On June 17 2021, the Court of Appeal quashed the order of (Judge Richardson), made on March 8 2021, staying the case against Nazir Ahmed, Mohammed Tariq and Mohammed Farouq as an abuse of process.”