Graduate Angelo Fernando, 46, says the younger woman consented to the airport-style body search after he claimed to have been drugged and robbed of his watch and cash on another date.
The former City worker, of Chifney Court, Bridle Close, Surbiton has pleaded not guilty to one count of sexually assaulting the woman at the Park Plaza Hotel, Westminster Bridge Road, on August 28, 2019.
The woman, who has a Masters degree in acting, told Inner London Crown Court Fernando touched her between her legs and ran his hands over her breasts during the pre-date frisk near a fire exit.
Both were registered with the SeekingArrangement dating site, which matches ‘Sugar Daddies’ with ’Sugar Babies’.
They sat down for a drink in the hotel bar after the search and Fernando told the trial his date said she was working on a screenplay she hoped would become a sitcom.
“She said she joined the site in order to meet somebody who could provide her an allowance. Somebody who could help her fund the production of the screenplay and contribute towards her university expenses.
“Because the Masters in Acting was quite expensive she was looking for three thousand pounds a month.
“She would see me on a weekly basis in exchange for three thousand pounds a month and wanted the first instalment after the date.”
However, during her evidence the complainant denied asking Fernando for any money and said she only continued with the date to expose him.
“After I rebuffed that her body language changed and she became quite belligerent,” Fernando told the jury. “She was disappointed, it was written all over her face.
“She then started complaining about the search and said how uncomfortable it made her feel.
“She started scratching her leg and that made me subconsciously think: ‘Has she got drugs in her underwear?’
“I was not going to transfer three thousand pounds into the account of someone I had just met.
“She said: ‘I’m going home, this is a waste of time. She leaned in and I gave her a kiss on the cheek and she walked off and that was it.
“I thought she was flirtatious when she first sat down in the alcove. I did not think she was somebody who was mercenary.
“I was disappointed, but it is not unusual for women on that site to project one image, but whose motivations are completely different.”
Fernando - who claims his legal first name is Stefan - admitted using a different spelling of that name on the website and a younger age, but insisted this was for his own protection.
“There are some very unsavoury people on that site. I have been blackmailed, I have been doxxed so I have chosen to be a little discreet so people cannot look me up.”
Describing himself as a financial modelling consultant, Fernando said he paid the dating site’s £60 per month fee, but would never describe himself as a ‘Sugar Daddy’ and did not reveal any financial information.
“I was looking for someone to travel with, to go to nice venues with and had no expectation of a physical relationship,” he told the court. “I would always pay and I would buy presents because they were a friend.”
Fernando said his OCD, coupled with once being drugged resulted in a need to search all future dates thoroughly.
“On my third date with one girl she slipped a sedative into my drink at a Charing Cross pub. I became very dizzy and disorientated and woke up in the street several hours later with my watch and money clip missing.”
He explained this to the complainant before they met. “I told her on the phone I would check the areas covered by her underwear, not internally, but on the outside.
“I told her about the search and she seemed sympathetic and there was no talk of a professional doing it.
“I ran my hand between her breasts and she was not wearing a bra. I started off by running the blade of my hand between her breasts and ran my hand over her stomach and down the sides of her dress.
“She had the same search as anyone I met on that site,” added Fernando, denying he touched the woman between her legs or touched her breasts.
“I searched behind her ears as well, running my fingertips over her ears and asked her to take her shoes off.
“If I wanted to search her more thoroughly I had her consent to do that.”
During her evidence from behind a screen Fernando’s date sobbed as she said: “He started from the ankle up, all the way up and I felt very uncomfortable and told him to stop and he carried on with the other leg and the same thing happened again.”
She said on both occasions Fernando touched her between the legs. “He said it was necessary to have a search.
“He ran his hands down the side of my breasts and said: ‘Oh. You’re not wearing a bra,’ and then ran his hands down the front. It was a slow cupping motion.”
She was convinced by Fernando’s need for security because of his “highly sensitive” work in the US defence aerospace world.
“I thought he was some kind of spy that had a job that required you to have some sort of check,” she said. “He painted a picture really well that excited me and he was someone that I’d like to meet.
“He told me he moved about the world and was not based in London.
“The story of what he was doing, what he did and how he had been spiked and needed this security operation just to go on a date sounded like a different world.”
She felt Fernando had done this before and was careful to avoid CCTV bay taking her to the fire exit. “There was a wet mop and bucket and cleaning sign there and anybody could have walked in, but he said it was a discreet space out of the public eye.”
Denying she asked Fernando for £3,000 per month she told the court: “I signed-up for the website because it sounded exciting. Maybe I went on it because I was bored.
“What ’Stefan’ said to me in the first message sounded very exciting and very dramatic and I was interested to meet him.”
Trial continues………….
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