A north-east paramedic has gone on trial accused of a series of sex attacks on colleagues – while they were responding to 999 calls.
A jury heard yesterday that David Lee told one of his alleged victims he was an “animal with animal instincts”.
The woman also claimed he assaulted her in a lift on the way to an emergency and in the back of an ambulance.
She was giving evidence on the first day of Lee’s trial at Aberdeen Sheriff Court.
He faces a total of 15 charges involving five alleged victims.
Prosecutors claim he groped four of his colleagues and spoke to them in an inappropriate sexual manner while on duty.
He is also accused of indecently exposing himself to two of the women.
The 31-year-old is also alleged to have acted in a “culpable and reckless” manner towards all the women when they were behind the wheel of an ambulance.
Court papers state he unfastened their seatbelts while the vehicle was in motion.
He is accused of distracting them while they were driving the ambulance by putting rubber gloves down their tops and slipping the vehicle out of gear.
Lee denies the charges and has lodged a special defence claiming all sexual activity between him and the women was consensual.
Yesterday a jury of seven men and eight women heard evidence from two of the complainers during the first day of the trial.
The court heard that Lee had been working with the Scottish Ambulance Service (SAS), based in Aberdeen, for some time before the women joined the service.
At the time he is alleged to have committed the offences – between 2013-15 – he was a fully qualified ambulance technician and was training to be a paramedic.
The court heard there was a “large number” of staff employed by the SAS and depending on the rota they could be tasked to work with anyone at any given time.
The women said that despite being based in Aberdeen they could be tasked with attending call-outs all over the north-east as far away as Stonehaven and Peterhead.
One woman, who can not be named for legal reasons, said that at first she found Lee’s behaviour to be nothing more than childish and irritating.
However, she said that this gradually developed until he eventually sexually assaulted her in a lift on the way to an emergency and in the back of an ambulance.
The witness, who was in her early 20s at the time, said Lee would even attack when in the presence of a patient.
She said: “One job we were at was in a care home. We were in the lift taking the chair up to the patient and he pushed me into the corner of the lift and was trying to run his hands up from my waist to my chest.
“When we had the patient in the chair in the lift he was still trying to prod at my side as we were going down to the ground floor.
“I kept trying to push him off and told him to leave me alone”
Fiscal depute David Bernard said: “What was his reaction?”
“Called me boring or suggested that I was being moody,” she replied.
“I hit his hand away several times. I did not want to make a scene with the patient on the chair.”
Recalling another incident she said: “I remember we were at a job in the Stockethill area, which was just across from the depot.
“The patient did not need transferred to hospital so I went back to the ambulance to finish off the paperwork.
“At that time I was standing leaning against the side of the cupboard. He closed the door to the ambulance behind him and started trying to kiss me on the lips.”
She said on another occasion she threatened to stab him with a needle after he refused to left her go after he wrapped his arms around her and pushed himself into her back while in a store cupboard at the ambulance depot.
The woman said Lee, of Keir Circle, Westhill, also propositioned her on one occasion.
She said: “He propositioned me asking if I wanted to find somewhere, which I presumed meant to have sex.
“When I said no, he asked me if it was because of morals. I had asked him what his wife would have to say about it and he said ‘my wife knows what I am like’.
“He said he was an animal with animal instincts.”
Mr Bernard asked the woman why she had never reported the incidents to her boss.
She replied: “I thought about it but I was embarrassed to speak about it and I was worried that they would not believe me or that they told me ‘that’s just how it is’.”
The woman was asked if at any point she had wanted, agreed to or encouraged any of the behaviour she claimed she was subjected to.
She said: “No, never.”
The case, before Sheriff Graeme Napier, continues.
