A woman who had dreams of becoming a fashion model has claimed she was sexually assaulted by an Aberdeen photographer in a public park when she was a 16-year-old schoolgirl.
Simon ‘Sid’ Scott, 44, is on trial facing 13 charges of sexual assaults and indecent behaviour against a dozen young women and an underage girl – with many of the women offered free photoshoots with him.
Scott, of Sunnyside Road, Aberdeen, denies all the charges against him.
On the fifth day of evidence at Aberdeen Sheriff Court, a 24-year-old woman told jurors that Scott arranged to meet her for a “test-shoot” at a park in Glasgow in 2015 where he “violated” her.
She alleges that Scott requested her to pull down a leotard she was wearing to improve the quality of the photographs before approaching her and touching her breast.
Girl thought behaviour was ‘maybe the norm’
The woman – now a solicitor – said she was wary when asked to expose herself by Scott – but said that he reassured her by stating that he was “a professional” who wouldn’t do anything “indecent or distasteful”.
“I was very uncomfortable,” she said. “But being the age I was I didn’t feel confident enough to say – I took his word as his word.”
She claimed that Scott removed her hair from her breasts – which she had placed there to “protect her modesty”.
“He was kind of brushing the hair away from my breasts and my shoulders,” she said.
“There were also drops of rain on my skin which he was brushing away as well.”
Asked by fiscal depute Lynne MacVicar how she felt a that point, she said: “I had never done a photoshoot before and I thought that that was maybe just the norm.
“I didn’t want to come across as being ungrateful.”
The woman also claimed that, following the photoshoot, Scott then told her to stand next to a tree trunk and raise her arms where he took a Polaroid picture of her.
Responding to a question from Ms MacVicar about her report to police in 2020, the woman said that after speaking to others within the modelling industry she became aware that what happened “wasn’t the norm”.
“I knew what happened hadn’t been right and I think I had known that for a while,” she said.
During cross-examination by defence advocate David Taylor, he quizzed the woman over whether she had been struggling to follow his client’s instructions that day – requiring him to touch her.
“Is it possible [Mr Scott] was having trouble getting you to understand what he needed you to do?” he asked.
“I don’t recall him giving me any directions,” she replied.
Mr Taylor also suggested to the woman that any contact Scott made with her hair or breast was “a fleeting contact?”
“It wasn’t fleeting, it was prolonged,” she said.
‘It was dangerous’
Evidence was also heard by a second woman who, as a teenager, was signed to a professional modelling agency.
She claims Scott invited her to a forest and photographed her topless.
The woman, now 24, said she stopped working with Scott due to feeling “embarrassed, exposed and vulnerable” during the shoot.
She told the jury that she agreed to be photographed by Scott in woodland on the outskirts of Aberdeen when she was 18.
She described how Scott encouraged her to remove her top before placing her hair over her breasts and photographing her entire body.
The former model said she and Scott had agreed there would be no nude shots taken prior to the photoshoot.
Claims accused ‘crossed a boundary’
Asked by fiscal depute why she didn’t want to work with him again after that incident, she said: “I wasn’t respected during that photoshoot.
“He was unprofessional and was crossing a boundary for me as a model and also as a person.
“I didn’t want to be in that position again and I couldn’t speak up – it was dangerous.”
“Your objection is that he jumped back and started taking pictures?” Mr Taylor asked the woman as he cross-examined her.
“Yes,” she replied.
He asked her if she would agree that what often happens when photographers take wide shots is that they would be “cropped and edited” later on.
“I would,” she said.
The trial, before Sheriff Morag McLaughlin, continues.
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