Stalking victim in a cemetery, rapist who’d been freed just 5 days earlier
THIS chilling image shows a rapist stalking his victim through a graveyard – just five days after he was let out of prison.
He beat the woman so brutally as he sexually assaulted her that she was left partially deaf and blind.
Alec Lowther, 21, had served two jail sentences for theft and was released in the week of the attack. He followed his victim as she walked to work in the early hours of the morning.
Harrowing CCTV footage shows Lowther close in on the woman, who is in her 40s, as she quickens her pace and breaks into a jog.
He raped his victim three times before stripping her of her clothes and stealing her mobile phone, along with £15 from her pockets. She was beaten so badly she lost consciousness, leaving her suffering splitting headaches that she could experience for life, along with hearing and vision problems.
Once the Eastern European woman regained consciousness, she had to put her jeans back on and walk home ‘covered in blood’, a court heard.
The rapist was jailed for life with a minimum term of five years and four months – although a judge said it may never be safe to release him.
Judge Jeremy Richardson QC told Lowther at Hull Crown Court: ‘As the consequences for your victim will be lifelong, so will your sentence. She will always have a reminder of your evil conduct. Her life has been shattered.’ After leaving her home in Hull at 3.45 on September 20 last year, the victim passed Lowther as he sat near a caravan site. The criminal, who is from the travelling community, followed her under the guise of asking the time.
When they reached the graveyard, Lowther grabbed hold of the woman and threw her over a fence.
Simon Waley, prosecuting, said: ‘He then jumped on top of her and began to beat her, and he dragged her into a dark corner. He continued to hit her to the head with his fist and then went to pull off her clothes ... She remembers that he was threatening to kill her.’
Lowther, of no fixed address, was questioned three days later after DNA taken from the victim matched his profile. He admitted rape, robbery and inflicting grievous bodily harm.