Physio jailed over string of attacks

Aphysiotherapist from Fife who attacked four women during a prolonged spell of offending has been jailed for nine years.

Derek Adams, 59, perpetrated crimes against women and children over more than 20 years.

Adams, of Bennachie Way, Dunfermline, had denied a string of charges during a trial at the High Court in Edinburgh but was convicted of 12 offences, including two rapes, an attempted rape and an indecent assault.

He was also found guilty of physically assaulting four women and two children, including a two-year-old girl.

Adams was also convicted of threatening or abusive behaviour to one woman who was treated in a controlling way.

One woman told the court that after he raped her at an address in Fife he told her: “That makes us even.”

As well as sending him to prison yesterday, Lady Carmichael ordered the authorities to supervise him for three years following his release from custody.

She also made an indefinite non-harassment order preventing him from contacting or communicating with one of his victims.

She said: “You appear as a first offender and I accept you have been a productive member of society outside the context of your offending.

“It is offending that has had significant effects on the complainers.

“The picture with which I am presented is of someone who does not recognise he has done anything wrong and continues to blame the complainers.”

Adams is listed online as a physiotherapist, offering a range of medical treatments from his base in Dunfermline.

He was convicted following trial at the High Court last month.

The court heard how a woman who was raped at a house in Fife said she had made contact with Adams through an online dating site.

She said he first appeared to be “charismatic, friendly, educated and funny”.

He later became “very cold” towards her and began making derogatory remarks. She said: “He would constantly tell me I was useless.”

She said Adams told her she should just kill herself.

The woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court during the rape he pinned her down on a bed and restricted her breathing and told her “that’s what you deserve”.

She said Adams then acted “as though nothing had happened”.

The woman said on other occasions Adams had threatened to break her legs and kill her.

Adams raped the woman in January 2011 and carried out assaults on her between January 2011 and February the following year.

The woman said on one occasion at a Tesco store in Dunfermline in 2011 Adams lost his temper with a crying little girl and slapped her, leaving a hand print on her face.

Adams’ abusive offending began in 1985 in the Clarkston area of Glasgow.

He threw a woman on to the floor, forced her outside a house wearing only nightclothes and struck her on the head.

He later raped her. He also attempted to rape another woman at a house in Clarkston between 1989 and 1990.

He carried out a sex attack on another woman at a house in Winchburgh, in West Lothian, in 1996.

OFFENDER: Derek Adams committed crimes against women and children over more than 20 years.