A POLICE officer accused of raping a woman while he was on a training course in Warwickshire will not stand trial until spring next year, a judge has heard.
Pc Nicholas Doherty pleaded not guilty at Coventry Crown Court to raping the woman – allegedly in a hotel room in Stratford in February 2012 while Pc Doherty, a serving officer with Cumbria Police, was attending a training course in Warwickshire.
Doherty, who is currently suspended from duty pending the outcome of the case, also denied three other sexually related charges against the woman.
On a further indictment 41 year-old Pc Doherty of Powerful Street, Walney, Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, pleaded not guilty to indecently assaulting another woman in 1999 by allegedly grabbing her breast.
Prosecutor Simon Phillips said the trial on the rape charges has been fixed for March 9 next year, with an estimate of eight days.
Adjourning the case, Judge Richard Griffith-Jones granted Pc Doherty bail with conditions he does not have any contact with the two women or other witnesses.
At an earlier hearing Tom Schofield, defending on that occasion, said the rape allegations were ‘emphatically denied,’ and that the defence case was that the acts were all consensual.
