Sunderland footballer Jack Diamond found not guilty of rape and sexual assault

• Jack Diamond reads a statement outside court following the verdict

A footballer has been found not guilty of raping and sexually assaulting a woman he originally met on Tinder after inviting her to his home.

Sunderland winger Jack Diamond, 23, denied assaulting the woman at his house in Fatfield, in Washington, Sunderland, in May 2022.

Prosecutors had claimed Diamond forced himself on the complainant after agreeing before she came around that “nothing more than cuddling would happen”.

Diamond told the court that all sexual activity between them that night had been consensual and that he believed the woman had been “in a mood with him” after she initiated full sex and he refused.

On Monday 8 January, a jury took about 15 minutes to find him not guilty of both charges. Applause could be heard from the public gallery after the verdicts were announced.

After being asked to sit following the announcement, Diamond put his head in his hand and started sobbing.

Newcastle Crown Court heard Diamond and the woman became “friends with benefits” after meeting on a dating app and both agreed the relationship was “95% about sex”.

Diamond told the court he hoped that sexual activity might happen when he invited the woman round that night but that “it wasn’t at the forefront of my mind”.

Prosecutor David Povall had said the woman consented to some sexual activity before Diamond went to sleep but told jurors that he then woke up and sexually assaulted and raped her.

Diamond told the court the woman got into bed with him and there was some sexual activity, but that when she tried to initiate full sex, he said: “I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

He said the woman turned away from him so he started to touch her again “to almost comfort her because I thought she was getting in a mood” but she pushed his hand away.

Diamond said he “wasn’t really that fussed” and thought the woman was “in a huff”.

He told the court he went to the toilet and got back into bed before the woman got up and said she was going to leave.

In her closing speech, Eleanor Laws KC, defending Diamond, said he was “not the entitled, arrogant footballer who thought the world owed him everything, but a 19-year-old man (when he first met the complainant) who made mistakes".

Ms Laws told jurors: “He is not on trial for being immature, he is not on trial for making mistakes, he is not on trial for misreading the signals about whether he had hurt someone.”

The player was on loan with Lincoln City last season but the deal was terminated after he was charged, and Sunderland suspended him.

In a statement, Sunderland AFC said: "Sunderland AFC notes the verdict from Newcastle Crown Court today, where a jury has found Jack Diamond not guilty of all charges. 

"Following the conclusion of the judicial process, Jack will now return to the Academy of Light and resume footballing activity.

"SAFC will be making no further comment at this time."

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