Four young agriculture students were dragged through 'hell' by bungling rape detectives who 'buried' the evidence that eventually caused the case against them to fall apart.
The quartet, who were arrested after a group sex session at a student ball at the Royal Agricultural University in Cirencester, Gloucestershire, told Mail Online that police treated them as 'guilty until proven innocent'.
Thady Duff, Leo Mahon and Patrick Foster, all 22, and James Martin, 20, had denied charges of rape and sexual assault.
The Gloucester Crown Court case against them fell apart after it emerged that the alleged victim had reportedly given 'different accounts' as a witness in another rape case.
This included messages taken from the victim’s phone hinting that she may have consented.
Martin said: 'If the police had done their job properly it would have been over a long time ago and I would have years of my life back.'
His barrister Edward Henry accused officers of 'airbrushing' and 'cherry-picking' evidence and said there will need to be a review.He told Mail Online: ‘We need to know the answers to some questions. Why this should have gone on for so long as it has? Why it took 13 months to decide to charge these defendants in the first place?'
The young men were arrested on suspicion of rape and sexual assault after a drunken sex session on the night of the ‘Mad Hatters’ May ball at the Royal Agricultural University in 2014.
A video of the act was shared on social messaging app Snapchat - leading the woman involved to tell police she had been raped.
The Royal Agricultural University is known as the 'Oxbridge of the Countryside' and the sons and daughters of many of Britain's biggest landowners are among its 1,200 students. The patron is Prince Charles and one of its former students is Captain Mark Phillips, former husband of Princess Anne.
A hearing will be held at a later date to consider defence legal costs. None of the men are currently students at the agricultural university.
A CPS spokesperson said: 'The CPS has a duty under the Code for Crown Prosecutors to keep cases under continuous review.During the course of legal argument at the beginning of this trial, information came to light which meant that we were no longer satisfied that there was sufficient evidence to provide a realistic prospect of conviction.'
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