‘NASTY, EVIL’ CHILD RAPIST JAILED
NEARLY 20 YEARS OF ABUSE
A PREDATORY child rapist who committed a long campaign of abuse against two vulnerable girls has been locked up.
Preston Paris preyed on the children, grooming them from a young age and subjecting them to sexual abuse through to adulthood.
The 50-year-old American national, who lived in Tarragon Road, off Western Boulevard, Bede Island, Leicester, arrived in the UK in 2001 and within months had started abusing the victims.
Paris was found guilty of 15 offences, including indecent assault, sexual activity with a child, sexual intercourse with a child under 13 and five counts of rape on Monday following a trial at Leicester Crown Court, and on Friday returned to the court for sentencing.
He was given 10, 23 and 24 years in prison. The terms will run alongside each other, or concurrently, meaning his term is effectively 24 years. Paris will have to serve two-thirds of his sentence before being considered for parole.
A spokesman for the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said after the hearing: “He abused both victims throughout their childhood, raping one repeatedly from the age of just eight and the second from when she was 12.
“Paris used violence, threats, emotional abuse and even further rapes to keep them under his control. The ordeal for both finally ended when one of the victims reported the abuse in 2017.”
His second victim then came forward to report his crimes against her.
Judge Ebrahim Mooncey said: “In sentencing you, totality is the key. I have to look at your offending as a whole and impose a sentence that in my view is required to meet the justice of the case.”
Commenting on the case, Liz Fell, senior crown prosecutor for the CPS’s rape and serious sexual offences team in the East Midlands, said: “Preston Paris’s crimes will stay with his victims forever.
“Having endured unimaginable abuse for such a long and significant period of their lives, I am in awe of their courage, dignity and patience throughout the prosecution and the trial.”
She revealed that because the sexual abuse had been so prolific, the CPS could not charge the defendant for each time he had raped or abused the girls.
Instead, he was prosecuted for one count for every type of offence he had committed during the entire period.
Ms Fell said: “Rather than admit his appalling crimes in the face of their evidence, Paris accused both victims of lying and claimed they had made their allegations up.
“The truth was he had taken advantage of their young age to make abuse a fact of their lives as they grew up.”
She added: “In court they overcame years of trauma to give clear and compelling evidence.
“The detail about what they had suffered was harrowing and Paris had cruelly manipulated them to prolong the abuse. The jury’s guilty verdict and today’s sentence reflects that his actions took away the childhood of two innocent children for his own selfish gratification.”
Speaking at the conclusion of the case, Detective Constable Anna Blockley, of Leicestershire Police’s historic child abuse investigation unit, said: “Paris began abusing the first victim nearly 20 years ago – but today is finally facing the consequences of his abhorrent and unspeakable crimes.
“I am pleased he has been brought to justice and is going to serve a significant custodial sentence.”
She added: “While no time in prison will erase the victims’ memories of the abuse and suffering they had to endure, I hope they can take some relief from the fact he is no longer living as a free man.”
Paris has also been made subject to a sexual harm prevention order.