Q:

Misuse of the verb allege?

I recently visited Jordan on a business trip. Read the following in a newspaper:

Bleeding profusely, she pleaded with the alleged attacker, Mushataq, to
  take her to a hospital.

My understanding is that if we accuse someone of committing a crime but the proof of the wrongdoing isn't yet found, use the verb allege.

Is the phrasing correct or it's a misuse of the verb allege?

A:

Alleged
(adjective) : said or thought by some people to be the stated bad or illegal thing, although you have no proof. (Cambridge dictionary).

The sentence essentially says the accused man committed the crime. 
  In my opinion, the writer has used "alleged" as a synonym for "accused", though in its objectionable sense.

Another fairer phrasing could be:

Bleeding profusely, she pleaded with her attacker- alleged to be Mushataq- to take her to a hospital.

It is routinely applied to actions,events, and things that have been asserted
but not proved.
In Journalism, the use of "allege or the relative adverb allegedly", protects
them from any libel suit.
Some examples:

Several alleged drug lords are to be put on trial.
Opposition parties have protested over alleged vote rigging in the
election
They were in the house when the alleged crime took place.

A:

Alleged is an adjective:

ADJECTIVE
[ATTRIBUTIVE]
Said, without proof, to have taken place or to have a specified
  illegal or undesirable quality:

In that sentence, it correctly modifies attacker as an adjectival use of the past participle form:

mid-15c., "quoted," past participle adjective from allege. 
Attested from 1610s in sense of "brought forth in court;" 1670s as
  "asserted but not proved."

The adjectival use of verbs is quite common as you will find in this link.

As a third party news report in the public realm, inserting the adjective alleged is a professional practice to protect the author and publisher from legal liability. Though she did not plead with her alleged attacker, but with her attacker, the news reporter is prohibited by professional ethics and liability from communicating that assumption to the public, and the simplest linguistic insertion of alleged is a ubiquitous CYA technique in journalism. 

The obviously logical:

Bleeding profusely, she pleaded with the attacker, Mushataq, to take  her to a hospital.

is transformed by liability considerations to:

Bleeding profusely, she pleaded with the alleged attacker,
  Mushataq, to take her to a hospital.

Normally, people ignore the insertion, but from time to time, pedants make hay from the humorous ambiguities the added word can imply.

oxforddictionaries.com
www.etymonline.com

