An “obsessed” builder abducted, raped and cut the throats of two young women, killing one and leaving her body in a freezer at a disused house, a trial has heard.

Mujahid Arshid, 33, had planned for weeks to abduct the two women, one of whom was his niece, recruiting Vincent Tappu, a labourer, to help in the abduction, the Old Bailey in London was told on Wednesday.

Arshid allegedly bundled the women into the boot of his car and took them to a house he was renovating. While there, he raped both women and attacked them with a lock knife, jurors were told.

One of the women managed to escape and raise the alarm after persuading Arshid they could be together, the court heard.

Police went to the six-bedroom house in Wimbledon, south-west London, and discovered the body of Arshid’s niece Celine Dookhran, 20, in a locked freezer in a utility room.

Arshid is accused of the abduction, rape and murder of Dookhran, and the abduction, rape, and attempted murder of the other woman, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, in July last year.

Crispin Aylett QC, prosecuting, told jurors the case was “simply horrific”.

Arshid had become “sexually fixated” on the women and concluded that if he could not have them no one else could, Aylett said.

At the time, both women had boyfriends and Dookhran had moved into Arshid’s home, having fallen out with her parents over her relationship.

The defendant had allegedly abused the other woman when she was 13 and was “beside himself with rage” that she was seeing someone else.

Aylett said: “The evidence in this case shows that, for a period of about three weeks before 19 July last year, the first defendant was planning to kidnap both young women.

“Thereafter, and it is as bizarre as it is terrible, he intended to rape them both before murdering them and disposing of their bodies. To that end he considered either putting them in acid or else concealing them in a deep freezer.”

On the evening of 18 July, Dookhran, who worked at Barclays bank in Mitcham, was under pressure to leave her boyfriend and Arshid put his plan into action, the court heard.

Wearing balaclavas and gloves, Arshid and Tappu stuffed socks into the women’s mouths and bound their hands and feet before Arshid took them to the house in Wimbledon, where Arshid had installed a chest-high freezer two days earlier.

Armed with the knife, Arshid allegedly raped each woman in turn in an upstairs bedroom. He then killed Dookhran and cut the other woman’s throat, but she managed to dupe him into believing they could still be together, jurors heard.

She was able to ring home and raise the alarm, even though she did not know where she was. After leaving with Arshid, she was taken to hospital by his brother, the court heard.

She gave police a description of the house and the officers found Dookhran’s body.

Arshid, of no fixed address, is also accused of false imprisonment and possession of a firearm with intent, as well as the earlier sexual assault and assault by penetration of the surviving woman.

Tappu, 28, of Acton, is charged with the abduction and false imprisonment of both women, and possession of a firearm with intent.

Both men deny the charges.