Three men found guilty over 'callous' rape of woman on Brighton beach

Three asylum seekers have been found guilty over the rape of a woman on Brighton beach in a "cynical, predatory and callous" attack.

The woman had been separated from her friends on a night out when the trio found her "staggering in the street", alone and "incapacitated", Hove Crown Court heard.

Two of the men took her behind a beach hut where they raped her, and the other went to the location moments later and filmed it.

Ibrahim Alshafe, 25, from Egypt, and Abdulla Ahmadi, 26, from Iran, had both denied two counts each of raping the woman on 4 October last year. They were found guilty.

Egyptian national Karin Al-Danasurt, 20, was also found guilty of all four counts of rape as a secondary party by encouraging and filming the ordeal.

Jurors returned their verdicts in the five-week trial after more than 12 hours of deliberation.

Footage showed the woman falling down twice, jurors were told, with prosecutors describing the alleged attack as "cynical, predatory and callous".

Alshafe was also shown smiling and sticking his tongue out during the assault, as well as slapping the woman in the face.

He and Ahmadi had claimed during the trial the encounter was consensual and that she had approached them along the seafront, kissed and touched them both, mentioned something about sex and took them both to the beach.

Al-Danasurt, who claimed to jurors he attempted to stop the attack by filming it, also denied he spat in the woman's mouth and called her a "dirty b****".

Prosecutor Hanna Llewellyn-Waters KC had told jurors: "Frankly, to these defendants, the complainant was meat.

"She was repeatedly abused for their sexual gratification and entertainment.

"They wanted sex. and that could be achieved by being with someone who was in no state to resist them."

She said the woman told police she remembered being spat on, kicked, and her throat being grabbed during the attack, as well as men laughing.

Giving evidence, the woman told the court: "It wasn't consensual... they are evil and they have ruined my life."

Being cross-examined from behind a screen in court, she cried as she said: "It's the filmer's face I see every time I close my eyes, laughing at me."

In a police interview played to jurors, recorded on 13 October 2025, the victim said she had been at a bar with friends until about 3am before heading to a nightclub near the beach.

She said she regained consciousness lying on the beach, and thought she was going to be killed.

In the recording, she said: "I closed my eyes because I thought 'oh my God, they're actually going to kill me', I can hear all these voices and I can't stop them."

The court also heard minutes after leaving the men, the woman spoke to her friends and was described as "wailing and hysterical saying she has been raped".

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CCTV footage from a nearby nightclub identified all three suspects, who had scanned their ID cards upon entering the club as part of the venue's own security measures.

They were identified, located and arrested.

Samples of DNA were taken from all three defendants.

DNA from both Alshafe and Ahmadi matched with samples taken from the complainant's body during a forensic medical examination, while Al-Danasurt's was inconclusive.

At the time of the incident, all three defendants knew each other, and were living at hotel accommodation for asylum seekers near Horsham, West Sussex.

The three men are due to be sentenced at the same court on 15 July.

Border security and asylum minister Alex Norris said the Home Office will seek to deport them once they have been sentenced.

Detective Chief Superintendent Richard McDonagh said: "These three predatory men took advantage of an extremely vulnerable woman, subjecting her to a prolonged, harrowing ordeal.

"I do not underestimate the strength and courage it required to report this to the police, and support the investigation as she dealt with the lasting impact of that morning's incident. Thanks to this woman's resolve, we have been able to bring her attackers to justice."

He added: "Women and girls should be able to feel safe in public and in private, at any time of the night or day.

"Brighton is a safe place, but incidents such as this serve as a sobering reminder of why we and our partners work so hard to prevent people from coming to harm, and tirelessly pursue perpetrators should the worst happen."

A further count of "sharing intimate films" without the complainant's consent, which Al-Danasurt faced, was withdrawn on after it was established that the offence could only be tried in a magistrates' court.

(c) Sky News 2026: Three men found guilty over 'callous' rape of woman on Brighton beach