TOMMY SHERIDAN paraded about a swingers club wearing only a small white towel only hours after he and his brother-in-law shared sex with a female activist, a court was told yesterday.

The MSP had been married for two years and was leader of the Scottish Socialist Party when he allegedly had unprotected sex with several partners on a day in November 2002.

Anvar Khan, a journalist, told the Court of Session in Edinburgh that she had sex with Mr Sheridan at a flat in Glasgow then saw Mr Sheridan have sex with Katrine Trolle alongside his brother-in-law, Andrew McFarlane. The group then drove to Cupid’s, a club in Manchester, where, she said, half-naked customers wearing nipple clamps and fishnet tights ate popcorn while watching pornography on a giant screen.

Mr Sheridan is suing News Group Newspapers, the publisher of News of the World, for £200,000 over articles about his sex life published in November 2004 and January 2005. He says that they are untrue and defamatory. In the fifth day of the case Ms Khan, 38, told the court that in November 2002 she flew from London to Glasgow to meet Mr Sheridan, with whom she says she had an affair between 1994 and 2002. “When we were at the flat in Ibrox, Tommy Sheridan said, ‘Why don’t we have some fun before we get to Manchester?’. He and I got undressed and started to have sex,” she said.

“At that point, Andy and Katrine came into the room to join us. I was not comfy with that and I got my clothes and walked out of the room. I have to testify that I saw Tommy Sheridan have sex with Katrine, and Andy was part of that threesome.”

She said that when they arrived at Cupid’s at about 10.30pm, Mr Sheridan and Ms Trolle went off together. “I asked Andy where they had gone. He said they had gone to a private room with some other people,” she said.

“I remember when Tommy came back I asked him, ‘Are you using condoms?’, and he gave me this quite a weird response. He said people were very respectable, very clean, they have good personal hygiene.

“I have to say, at that point, realising condoms were not being used, I vowed never again to have anything more to do with Tommy Sheridan.”

She said that the scene at Cupid’s was surreal. “There were people sitting on couches watching a big screen that was showing pornography. People were just sitting there eating popcorn, wearing nipple clamps and fishnet tights [and] barely speaking,” she said.

Ms Khan said that after leaving the club the group headed to a flat, where Mr Sheridan went “upstairs” with a barmaid he had picked up. Ms Khan said that the scene in Cupid’s was featured in the News of the World on October 31, 2004, although not all of the details were correct. She alleged that Mr Sheridan was the “Spanking Swinger” in the article.

The court had been told that Mr Sheridan’s parliamentary case worker almost quit after hearing Mr McFarlane brag about his stag night. Keith Baldassara, 49, who was best man at Mr Sheridan’s wedding, said: “He (Mr McFarlane) said there wasn’t enough room in the bed and there was somebody specially flown in from Birmingham for the night.” Mr Baldassara said that Mr Sheridan admitted to him that he had been there at the Glasgow hotel but that he had not participated and that no prostitutes were involved.

He also said that Mr Sheridan told him that he attended Cupid’s with Ms Khan, Ms Trolle and Mr McFarlane.

The trial continues.

Explore UK News

• Crime News

• Education News

• Health News

• Science News

• Scotland News

Times Recommends

• Donor organ allowed child’s own heart to heal
• Michael Jackson: Not the final chapter
• Brüno toned down for 15 rating