THE Sun won a legal battle to reveal that a child rapist was an asylum seeker.
Amin Abedi Mofrad, 35, was convicted of attacking a 15-year-old girl after throwing his coat over her head.
His legal team and prosecutors wanted to keep his asylum status secret during the trial — blocking The Sun from reporting it.
They claimed it could sway the jury’s verdict if they read about it and even cause protests outside the court.
Our lawyers argued a ban could be seen as an example of “two-tier” justice and there was no evidence the jury would be “distracted in any way by the defendant’s immigration status”.
Judge Maria Lamb, at Oxford crown court, backed The Sun, dismissing fears of public protests and trusting the jury to follow her instructions not to read reports on the case.
She said a ban could give “the impression there was preferential treatment to one particular section of the community”.
Mofrad lured his victim to a bench as she walked home from an under-18s club night in Oxford in February last year.
He forcibly kissed her, put his hand under her clothes and raped her in an alleyway.
He was convicted of rape and sexual assault last week and will be sentenced next month.
Mofrad, from Iran, was convicted of 11 assault offences in Germany between 2013 and 2019.
He was also stabbed 15 times in January by migrant Syed Barzegar, who was with him on the night of the rape.
They both stayed at the Holiday Inn Express in Oxford.
Barzegar was jailed for three years in August.
