Jury sent out to consider verdicts on police cadet leader accused of sexual grooming

A jury has been sent out to consider verdicts on a Greater Manchester Police constable accused of misconduct and sex assaults.

Adnan Ali, who ran a large cadet unit for the force, is alleged to have used the training scheme as a 'grooming playground' and 'exploited the freedom he was given'.

The 36-year-old father-of-one is on trial at Liverpool Crown Court where he denies twenty charges including sexually assaulting two teenage girls and a 17-year-old boy, and misconduct in public office involving sexualised conversations.

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He did not give evidence to the jury but his KC, Jane Osborne, addressed the jurors in her closing speech and suggested that the prosecution case was based on 'hyperbole not facts'.

She revealed that he considers himself bisexual and 'was attracted to other men'.

During the three week trial the court has heard claims that Ali, of Leighton Road, Old Trafford, sexually assaulted two teenage girls and a 17-year-old boy.

The misconduct charges involve alleged sexualised conversations with six other teenage boys and asking for and sending indecent images to some of them.

Ali, known as Adz, became police leader of Trafford cadets in 2013 after suffering post traumatic stress disorder after a serious knife injury while on duty.

He was based in Stretford and the cadet unit rapidly grew to about 130 cadets, the largest group in Greater Manchester. While he was head of the unit they won local and national awards which enhanced his reputation.

Prosecuting counsel, Anne Whyte, KC, has claimed that he 'threw out the rule book' and engaged in conduct and communications with cadets and apprentices which breached the boundaries he was supposed