Category: Thame news

THE Thame show has been chosen to stage qualifying rounds of the prestigous Horse of the Year show, and the London International Horse Show.
The Oxfordshire County & Thame Show, to give it its full title, will be held on Septemer 18, and competitors winning one of the top three places in this year’s Show Jumping class will automatically qualify for a position in the grade C final at The Horse of the Year Show, to be held in October at the Birmingham NEC.

The pony securing the Championship place in the Mountain and Moorland In Hand classes will qualify for the National finals at The London International Horse Show at Olympia in December.

The horse classes staged at this 153 year-old one day event are amongst the highest standard of any County show and encompass every discipline from show jumping to mare and foal classes. The opportunity for competitors to qualify for either of these esteemed national championships is certain to attract an even greater number of entrants.

The Annual Oxfordshire & Thame County Show regularly welcomes up to 20,000 visitors. Appealing to all ages, the Show offers ‘best of breed’ classes for cattle, sheep, donkeys, dogs, rabbits, pigeons and cage birds and creates an arena for vegetable and flower growers, flower arrangers, craftspeople and adult and junior domestic gods and goddesses to showcase their talents.

Starring in the main ring this year will be The Royal Artillery Motorcycle Display Team ? The Flying Gunners – who will be staging hair raising white knuckle displays of speed and daredevil precision throughout the day.

Dressed in their Kilts and Sporrans, the Pipes and Drums 1066 (Hastings) Marching Band will be piping authentic Highland tunes and airs for the entertainment of visitors.

As well as the main ring events, the show will be offering a wealth of stimulating attractions such as the “tricky tykes” terrier racing team, mountain bike stunt riding, the welsh axemen, sheepdog, falconry and gundog displays, old and new agricultural machinery, horse and vintage tractor ploughing competitions, classic cars, and a premier status dog show with up to 1000 top quality dogs of all shapes and sizes competing.

The Food Hall will be flooded with fantastic aromas of produce from around the country with a special section devoted to the Oxford Food Group for you to sample on site or take home with you. Craftspeople from across the South East will be staging demonstrations, offering advice and selling beautiful gifts and keepsakes in the Craft Tent. A New indoor shopping village and a wide range of specialist trade stands will be catering for every retail requirement.

Advance tickets are now on sale: adults

WARNING – The following report contains sexual references that may offend.
A COURT heard today the most shocking evidence so far, on the third day of the trial of a hair and scalp specialist who runs a clinic in Thame.
A former client of the defendant, Praminder Mankoo, who was treated by him on several occassions, said that, in her final massage session with him, despite having felt “embarrassed” and “uncomfortable” having her breasts massaged by Mankoo twice before, she returned for a third time.

It was during this final session, she said, that Mankoo removed all his clothes (saying it was hot in the room) and stood before her naked, in a state of ‘high arousal’ (Editor’s paraphrase) before suggesting she perform a sexual act on him.
“I was shocked – confused – I felt lost,” she said.
Nevertheless, she admitted that she did ‘help him to a point of climax’ (Editor’s paraphrase) over her body.

“I touched him,” she said, “because I felt it was a compromise and then I could go without coming to any harm.”

When asked by the Defence Counsel why she had returned to the clinic after her experience to buy hair products, the witness said: “..because the treatment was working – my hair was improving dramatically.”

The Defence Counsel then told the witness: “I would suggest that by the third massage, you were were having a consensual sexual relationship with Mr Mankoo.
“Why didn’t you say to him that you would prefer not to have your breasts massaged?”

“Because,” replied the witness, “I never spoke about these things – I was not brought up that way. I was not strong enough”

Defence Counsel: “You were starting to like him a lot, and you were encouraging him to touch you lower and he would not.
“He asked you to breath deeply and you were moaning.
“You were trying to get him into a sexual relationship.”

“No, no!” replied the witness. She then admitted to being “a bit sexually aroused” during her second massage.

The Defence’s suggestions of complicity continued: that the two of them undressed each other, that the witness asked Mankoo for sex and that she offered to masterbate him – all of which the witness repudiated.

Defence Counsel: “Why didn’t you say you wanted it to stop?”

Witness: “Because I was frightened – he is a man – he is stronger than me.”

The judge then asked the witness why she didn’t just get out of the room and why she did not report the incident to the authorities. The witness replied: “I have been raised in a macho culture; you do not argue with men.
“I didn’t complain because I had not been raped.”

The case continues tomorrow.

THE woman who accused a Thame hair consultant of trying to force her to commit a sexual act during a massage session, today reputed in court that she herself became sexually aroused during her treatment, and that she willing gave him manual relief (Ed’s words).
The same witness, in the trial of Praminder Mankoo, of Oakley, near Thame, yesterday described how her search for treatment to prevent thinning hair led her to report her experiences at his clinic to the police.
(See yesterday’s report).

A second witness today told Oxford Crown Court how she herself had visited Mankoo’s clinic in Thame, but had called an end to her treatment when she became uncomfortable that his comments were becoming more and more sexual.

The Chair of the Institute of Trichologists, Marilyn Sherlock, told the court how Mankoo had been struck off by her organisation in 1998, after a disciplinary hearing relating to a complaint from ‘patient’ and his acceptance of a caution by the police. She said that there is no clinical evidence that head massage relieves stress, that may lead to hair loss, and that massage of the breast area was not considered to be part of any treatment her members administered.

A beautician who went to see Mankoo in the summer of 2004, when she feared her hair was falling out, told the court how he used a vibrating massage machine over her nipples and then proceeded to massage her feet and thighs, supposedly to relieve the stress that was causing her hair loss.

She recalled feeling that the situation was moving towards something sexual when Mankoo encouraged her to remove her bra and the gown she had been given, and suggested that she “touch herself where ever she liked.”

She recalled keeping her eyes closed because she felt embarrassed and uncomfortable, and then, when she eventually opened them, she said, she saw Mankoo was standing in his boxer shorts. She described burn-like marks on his chest. The Defence suggested said she could have seen these even if he had been wearing his white coat, but the witness insisted that he had removed his coat.

It was at this point she said, that she had to leave, paid her bill and made another appointment which she had no intention of keeping.

She was then questioned by the Defence as to why she did not tell anyone about what had happened until two years later when she met Mankoo again at the Social cafe/bar in Thame. Her husband later told the court how his wife had told him and the barman at the Social, “No woman should be left alone with that man,” and he began to suspect that something upsetting had happened to her at Mankoo’s clinic.

The witness’s reply was that she had been “too embarrassed and ashamed to mention it,” but felt that it ought to come out into the open when she saw a news report about Mankoo’s arrest on the television.

When asked why she didn’t end the massage session sooner, the woman replied that she felt “stupidly, in a situation that she could not get out of – out of fear – out of control.”

Defence counsel, Christine Agnew, suggested to this witness that Mankoo did not remove his trousers nor touch her inappropriately, to which whe replied that he most definitely had.

The Prosecution counsel then read out statements made by another complainant’s husband and daughter which spoke of the woman’s ‘agitation’ and how she was “angry and upset” after having been to see Mankoo with a hair problem. Like previous witnesses, this woman too was said to have experienced sexual innuendo and had it suggested to her by Mankoo that she wear different underwear for her next appointment.

The final witness of the day was a previous, temporary employee of Mankoo’s. She described how she had eventually agreed to a free massage by him on a quiet afternoon when there were no clients, because he suggested it might relieve some of the stress she was experiencing following the break up of a relationship.

After removing her top clothes and going along with the massage, she began to feel uncomfortable, she said, when Mankoo asked her: “If these were someone else’s hands, what would you want them to do?”

She then asked for the massage to stop, saying that she just was not able to relax.

The woman continued to go into work a couple of times after the incident, she said, but never felt comfortable with her employer again. She put the whole thing to the back of her mind, she said, but decided to do something about what had happened when she saw a police notice about an investigation into complaints against Mr Mankoo, thinking that “now something needed to be said. It had been playing on my mind, she said. “I felt stupid and gullible to let things go on as they did.”
“I felt unclean after the massage; like an ostrich I tried to forget it.”

The case continues tomorrow.

A COURT heard today how a Thame hair consultant allegedly grasped the face of a patient during a head massage and tried to force her to commit a lewd act with him.
Praminder Mankoo, who runs ‘Hairology’ in Thame, is on trial for two offences of indecent assault and nine of sexual assault against women who had sought his help for hair or scalp problems.
This, the first witness called in the case, an unmarried mother at the time, alleged that Mankoo assaulted her in 1998 whilst he was practicing trichology in Maidenhead.

She told the court that he described her underwear as ‘boring’ and suggested that she might like to wear “more sexy underwear and high boots” for her next appointment as it would boost her confidence and self-esteem.
She went on to tell how, as he massaged her head, shoulders and arms and the top of her cleavage, Mankoo suddenly dropped his trousers and pants and used offensive, sexual inuendo. She was very scared, she said, because she knew she was alone in the building with Mankoo and did not want to cause a confrontation.

After what seemed hours, continued the witness, Mankoo apparently seemed to switch suddenly back to, what she described as “professional mode” allegedly saying: “You’re obviously not going to do it,” and left her alone to get dressed. Finally, she said, he tried to get her to make another appointment but she pretented that she did not have her diary with her and said that she would telephone the next day. He then apparently said: “I haven’t lost your custom have I?”

The witness then told the court that when Mankoo phoned her the next day, she pretended to be someone else and said that ‘Miss H’was not in.

Following her complaining about his behaviour to the Institute of Trichology and the police, Mankoo was cautioned by the police and struck off the professional register of the ‘Institute for five years. He never re-applied to join.

When questioned about whether she noticed anything about Mankoo when he dropped his trousers, the witness described scar tissue she had noticed on his abdomen, which she said resembled a burn.

‘Miss H’ will return to the witness box when the trial resumes tomorrow morning at Oxford Crown Court.

Photo: Praminder Mankoo

THE Mayor of Thame will officially open a new shop in Thame tomorrow morning (30/08/08).
The shop, in North Street, Thame (opposite the Cattlemarket)is the venture of a Thame man, James Butler and his partner, Helen Sellwood who worked at the recently closed ‘Pied Pedaller’ toy shop.
Cllr Don Butler will open ‘The Spinning Top’ at 10.30am.

THAME golfing enthusiasts are being invited to join Thame’s Mayor for a charity golf day to raise money for the town’s community hospital.
Magnolia Park Golf & Country Club is the venue, and October 10, 2008, is the date of the event which will include a sumptuous dinner afterwards. Non golfing family and friends are welcome to attend the evening celebratory meal.
The cost is Golf and meal

MEMBERS of the district council’s planning committee are to visit the old Thame United Football ground before deciding whether or not to approve outline planning permission for a housing development on the site.
Thame Town Council has already recommended refusal of the plan for around 90 new homes on the site, in Windmill Road, Thame, mainly on the grounds of traffic generation.

South Oxfordshire District Council’s planning committee however, feel that they need to the see the site for themselves in context with the surrounding area before making a decision.

The planning officer in the case has expressed the view that he finds the application acceptable in principle.

The site visit is scheduled for September 15.

The Football club, now demolished, ceased to function in 2005 when it was taken into receivership following an unpaid VAT bill, and then sold to a developer for a pepper corn, on the proviso that the football club would get around

A THAME cycling enthusiast, who has done much to promote cycling in the Thame area through her training of both children and adults, has been given the accolade of ‘a Local Champion’ in a national competition.
Cathy Gaulter-Carter, of Aylesbury Road, Thame, was presented with a cup on behalf the the CTC, the UK’s National cycling organisation, after becoming the UK runner up following her award as the winner of the South East England heat of the competition.

In her capacity as Chair of the Thame Better Ways to School group, and later TWAC, Thame Walking and Cycling, Cathy was instrumental in the development of the Phoenix Trail, fighting tirelessly against planners, some local councillors and land owners less enthusiastic than she was about bringing about a shared use, cycling, walking and horse-riding path as a recreational facility to the town.

Cathy was presented with her cup by John Francis, a fellow campaigner and supporter of the Phoenix Trail, at the Three Horse Shoes pub, Towersey, a favourite ‘watering hole’ of users of the Phoenix Trail, following a celebration ride of the Trail with other enthusiasts and friends.

Typical of Cathy’s dedication to protecting the environment, was her declining an invitation to go and receive her award at Stormant Castle in Northern Ireland, which would have meant travelling by either plane or car and boat. It took weeks of clandestine planning and plotting to eventually get Cathy into a situation to be presented with her award locally, and so it was a huge surprise to her to be presented with the cup after, what she thought, was just a nice ride out and a meal with friends.

A HORSEBREEDER from Chinnor has been fined after neglecting one of his animals.
Henry Light, of Lower Icknield Way, Chinnor, admitted failing to protect one of his animals from pain, suffering, injury, disease and suffering was ordered to pay