A TEENAGER told a court how she became infatuated with Fire Brigade Union boss Paul Ahmed during their brief affair.

The girl, who is not being named to protect her identity, said 44-year-old Mr Ahmed bombarded her with explicit texts during their relationship in early 2003.

Giving evidence via a video-link at Newcastle Crown Court yesterday, she said: "I was totally infatuated with him."

Prosecutors said Mr Ahmed, the secretary of the Fire Brigades' Union's South Tyneside branch, seduced the girl, then 14, into having sex with him by sending her explicit texts.

Mr Ahmed, of Carnegie Close, South Shields, South Tyneside, denies indecent assault, indecency with a child, inciting indecency with a child and an attempted serious sexual assault.

He accepted during police interview that he had met the girl on some occasions and said there had been contact via text. But he denies inappropriate conduct.

The girl told how she confessed to her stepmother about the affair in January last year.

She told jurors: "She had seen my phone and read the messages off Paul.

"She said she knew there was something going on, so I told her about it."

The girl told the court how the texts with Mr Ahmed started out as "mostly jokes".

Prosecutors accept the girl consented to sex, but was too young by law.

The trial continues.