Alex Salmond impersonated zombie before sexually assaulting SNP worker, jury hears

Former first minister of Scotland stands trial on 14 charges including attempted rape

The former first minister denies all charges (PA)

Alex Salmond pretended to be a zombie before sexually assaulting an SNP worker, a jury has heard.

The incident is alleged to have taken place at Bute House in Edinburgh in September 2014, the month of Scotland’s independence referendum.

Mr Salmond faces 14 charges of alleged offences against 10 women and is currently standing trial at Edinburgh’s High Court.

The charges include an attempted rape as well as sexual assaults.

He denies all the charges.

The court was told by one of the alleged victims, known as Woman J, that Mr Salmond had impersonated a zombie “with his arms outstretched” before touching her shoulders.

She then claimed he leaned in to kiss her cheeks and then her lips.

Woman J said she managed to break away from the accused, who apparently acted like “nothing had happened”.

She said she had been in “complete shock” and was frightened by the incident.

Shelagh McCall QC, a lawyer acting on behalf of Mr Salmond, put it to the witness that the incident never happened, which she denied.

The party worker also alleged the pair went into his office to do some work, where she complained it was cold.

Jurors heard that he then touched her leg above her knee and briefly touched her nose after making a comment about her face.

Earlier, another woman, a former civil servant known as Woman K, told the court she was “mortified” and “demeaned” after the accused reportedly grabbed her buttocks during a photograph at an event at Stirling Castle in November 2014.

She said: "I think my heart stopped, my adrenaline started pumping a bit.

"It made me just mortified. I just wanted to do my job, I wanted to be proud of myself coming in and doing my job and it felt like I was demeaned, that it was unprofessional, that there was nothing I could do about it."

She added that he had grabbed her buttock “forcibly” and that his actions had been “very deliberate”.

Gordon Jackson QC, another lawyer representing the former first minister, put it to Woman K that the incident has been about “power”, which she had previously told police, and was not sexual.

The charges he faces relate to the period between June 2008 and November 2014.

His lawyers earlier lodged special defences of consent and alibi.

They gave consent defences for three alleged sexual assaults and an alleged indecent assault against three women.

The trial continues.

Additional reporting from PA