A 70-year-old migrant has been spared jail for sexually assaulting a 12-year-old girl ‘while encouraging her to cover her head’.
Chaudhry Zaman had forcibly held the girl’s hand while she was walking home from school in Slough, Berkshire, then kissed her.
He told jurors he had been encouraging the girl to cover her head and telling her how she could do so.
The girl said her father now had to pick her up from school and she feels anxious during the school run.
Zaman, who was assisted by a Punjabi interpreter in court, was spared jail, in part due to his age.
The court heard the girl lost friends in her community after she came forward to make the allegation.
Judge Amjad Nawaz, describing the incident, told Zaman: ‘CCTV shows you holding her hand. She says she did not want to, her hand was forcibly held.
‘You were seen sitting on a bench with her and that is where she said that you kissed her on her lips.’
‘You claimed you were speaking to her and asking her, encouraging her, to cover her head and you were trying to tell her how she should cover her head.’
Ian Wright, prosecuting, said: ‘The defendant asked the child to be friends with him, asked her if she loved him and told her to keep it a secret.’
Mr Wright told how the victim was aged 12 years at the time and the defendant, who had no previous convictions recorded against him, was 68.
The prosecutor said the judge had raised a question about Zaman’s ‘immigration status’ following the trial.
He informed the court that the defendant was in the UK lawfully.
In a victim personal statement, the victim said: ‘After this happened to me, I found it really overwhelming.
‘I felt like throwing up because I felt so anxious about going to school again.
‘I did not feel like I could talk to anyone about what had happened because I did not think they would understand.’
The girl told Reading crown court that in the weeks following the incident she had lost some of her friendships.
‘I was picked up from school by my dad to make sure I was safe’, she added. This changed my routine and my family’s routine a lot. I still feel anxious now about what happened and I wish it did not happen to me.’
Zaman, who lives in Berkshire, had denied one offence of sexually assaulting a girl under 13 by touching but was convicted by a jury on October 24 last year.
Paul Douglass, defending, told Judge Nawaz that a pre-sentence report had recommended Zaman receive a community order.
The lawyer said: ‘Your Honour may think that is a just and proportionate sentence given the defendant’s age, his lack of previous convictions and the nature of the offence, albeit it was very alarming and distressing for the young girl involved.’
Mr Douglass said the defendant was described in the pre-sentence report as not accepting his guilty, but told the judge: ‘His response is that he is very sorry for what happened and it will never happen again’.
Judge Nawaz decided not to jail Zaman, agreeing with the author of the pre-sentence report that the defendant’s risk could be ‘managed in the community’.
He told the defendant: ‘The victim has lost her self-esteem, lost her confidence and lost her friends and that is all down to your actions, because she had to speak up about what had happened to her.
‘That has caused a breakup of friendships which she regrets.’
Judge Nawaz sentenced Zaman to nine months imprisonment, suspended for 18 months; with a requirement to do 18 hours of unpaid work in the community; a restraining order for five years which prohibited him from going within 200 metres of the girl’s school; and he was ordered to sign the sex offenders’ register for 10 years.
