Antoni Imiela denies nine counts of rape against women and girls

Antoni Imiela, of Appledore, Kent, denies the kidnap, attempted rape and indecent assault of the girl and counts of raping five women and three girls.

The girl is the first child to be cross examined by video link in a trial.

Mr Imiela is accused in a continuing case of forcing the girl into a car at knifepoint in Birmingham in November 2002, Maidstone Crown Court heard.

He then showed me the knife and said if I didn't get in, then he would kill me Alleged victim, aged 10

In a police video interview the day after the alleged attack, the girl said a man had driven up and at first offered her a lift, which she refused.

She said: "He then showed me the knife and said if I didn't get in, then he would kill me."

The girl, who is alleged to be Mr Imiela's final victim, told officers the man drove her around for five hours, constantly threatening her with the knife.

She told police: "I said 'please let me go, I'm begging you' and he said 'You see this knife, if you beg any more, then I am going to have to use it'.

He said 'I haven't got anything to lose but you have got your family to lose' Alleged victim, aged 10

"I couldn't cry any more because I thought he was going to use it. I was trying to hold it in."

The man forced her to perform a sex act and tried to rape her but failed.

The girl, now 12, was cross examined by video link to the courtroom, becoming the first child "victim" to be asked questions by the defence.

Rebecca Poulet, QC, defending, suggested the girl had asked Mr Imiela for a lift and was only in the car for a short time.

'Nothing to lose'

The girl, who denied the different version of events put to her, cried when the defence suggested her attacker had not tried to rape her.

Her mother, giving evidence, told the court how her daughter had rung her from another part of the city and told her she had been attacked.

The girl had earlier told the court how the man warned her not to tell anybody.

"He said 'I haven't got anything to lose but you have got your family to lose'."

The jury has heard that on 19 November, two days before the girl's alleged attack, Mr Imiela had provided a DNA sample to police in Kent investigating the series of rapes in London, Kent, Surrey and Hertfordshire.

The case continues.