‘I slapped her bottom too hard for it to be a sex assault’

A former Tory mayor who gave a woman a ‘comradely’ slap on the bottom at a Royal Navy charity fundraiser has been cleared of sexual assault. Mark Forsyth, 58, admitted touching the woman during an event at Admiralty House in Whitehall on February 2 last year, but told jurors he had no memory of the incident. He denied sexual assault and instead admitted common assault, after successfully arguing there was no sexual motive behind the slap. Forsyth told the court…