A SEXUAL predator subjected a young woman to a sustained attack after she got into what she believed was a taxi in the early hours, a court heard.

Burnley magistrates were told how the victim was locked in the vehicle and repeatedly groped by driver Abdul Zabbar Khan, who also kissed her on the lips. Khan finally let her out when she began to cry.

The 35-year-old married father-of-two, of Saxon Street, Burnley, had pleaded not guilty to sexual assault on November 2 last year but had been convicted after a trial on July 15. Khan was sentenced to 12 weeks in jail, suspended for two years, with two years’ supervision.

He must pay £250 compensation, £100 costs and an £80 victim surcharge and sign the sexual offenders register for seven years.

The Bench also imposed an order banning the restaurant kitchen worker from driving a vehicle when he would be alone with any female passenger, other than a relative.

Prosecutor Nigel Harrison said the woman, in her thirties, had been out in Burnley town centre and was walking down St James Street to get a taxi.

A driver asked where she was going, she told him the area she lived in and Khan told her to get in.

Mr Harrison said: “She assumed that the defendant was a taxi driver. That was not the case.”

Khan pulled into a car park then told the woman: “You are very pretty.” He then touched the woman's breast and tried to kiss her before taking her home.