When a rape victim called her brother saying “I’m with four” there was nothing to indicate that anything was wrong, a magistrate heard yesterday.

The brother, who is not being named to protect the alleged victim’s identity, testified that the phone call lasted only a few seconds. His sister sounded normal.

She was not crying or asking for help, the witness, an Italian national, said.

He was testifying in the case against Somalis Abdiraman Abukar and Liban Mohamud, both 26 of Floriana. They are pleading not guilty to the rape and violent indecent assault of the 21-year-old in March last year.

The witness testified that together with his girlfriend, his sister and a friend, who had a car, they had spent an evening out and were on their way back when his girlfriend vomited.

The friend was angry at this and dropped them off in Floriana.

He was looking after his girlfriend, who was still vomiting, but his sister took off, running after the car as she had left her iPad inside.

About 10 minutes later, the witness continued, he received the phone call from his sister.

In a previous sitting, the court heard that DNA and sperm matching that of the accused were found on the alleged victim’s clothes and under her fingernails.

In the same sitting, Charles de Flavia, 62, who housed the accused, testified that he had lent his car to them only for the men to return in the early hours of the morning and boast about raping a woman.

He said Mr Abukar had boasted that “they” had sex with the woman three times, adding that he held her by the neck while the rest hit her.

One of the men he hosted, and who has yet have to be arraigned, did not participate in the rape and Mr Abukar called him, in a derogatory tone, a homosexual, Mr de Flavia said.

The case continues.