The backseat fumble was a guilty secret Frank hoped to take to his grave ... until he became yet ANOTHER innocent victim of the historic sex offence witch-hunt
She gave me a condom… and I gave in to temptation
FRANK FULKER was hardly the first married man to harbour a guilty secret.
He immediately regretted his infidelity – a fumbled encounter in the back of a car – and was mortified when, eventually, his wife found out. But however shameful, it could hardly warrant what would happen a full 30 years later when two detectives walked up the path to his house.
That knock on the door was the beginning of a terrifying four-year ordeal that would shatter his life and that of his family, threaten him with a jail cell, and destroy for ever his faith in Britain’s system of criminal justice.
On the flimsiest and most inconsistent of evidence, Mr Fulker found himself accused of rape, only to be cleared unanimously after a court heard that the ‘victim’ was not only delusional shortly before contacting police, but had even handed Mr Fulker a condom before they had sex all those years ago.
But however clear the outcome was in court, piecing their lives back together is not so easy for Frank, 72, and his 69-year-old wife Jacque – pronounced Jackie.
Today, Frank is waiting for surgery for a leaking heart valve, a condition his doctors say has been worsened by the stress. His days as a property developer in Sussex are over, but so too is the dream of a peaceful retirement. He is furious at the treatment he and his wife have suffered, and scathing about the police’s insistence that the ‘victim’ must be believed, however flawed their story. It was, he says, a ‘journey through hell’.
Mr Fulker, a father-of-four and grandfather-often, was inspired to come forward to tell his story after reading an article in this newspaper two weeks ago about the case of former fire officer David Bryant, who was jailed, then dramatically cleared on appeal, for a historic sex offence.
The two innocent men are among numerous suspects whose names have been dragged through the mud on spurious grounds as detectives work from the benchmark that people complaining of abuse ‘should be believed’ in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal.
Along with ordinary men like Mr Fulker and Mr Bryant, a host of celebrities and prominent people have faced similar exposure, including Sir Cliff Richard, Paul Gambaccini, the late Lord (Leon) Brittan, and war hero Field Marshal Lord Bramall.
For Mr Fulker, it all started in 1983 when Jacque was in hospital and was visited by her husband and a female married friend who, for legal reasons, must remain anonymous.
Mr Fulker recalled how, after the hospital visit, he gave the woman, whom we will call Jane, a lift home. He said his passenger suddenly began telling him intimate details about her marital life. ‘As she was saying these things, she was giggling, then touching me on the leg, really coming on to me. I was going through a lot of stress with four children to look after and a wife in hospital. I know it’s no excuse, but like a fool I gave in to temptation.
‘We drove on to a dark lane and had consensual sex on the back seat. I had to unstrap the baby seat first and put it in the boot. She actually gave me a condom. The next morning I thought, oh my God, what have I done. She phoned me up and said she still had two condoms left, could we carry on? I said, look, we’re both married, I don’t want an affair.’
But they remained friends, with the two couples attending the same parties for the next three decades or so. There was no more sex, nor was it mentioned, and for Frank it became a distant, if guilty, secret.
By 2012, Jane was suffering from a psychiatric disorder and during her treatment told her husband and doctors about the 1983 episode with Mr Fulker.
Her husband’s first reaction was to call Jacque, who recalled: ‘He asked me round to his house. He couldn’t speak at first, but then he eventually cried, put his head on my shoulder and said, “They’ve… had sex.”
‘It was only when I was driving away that it hit me. I pulled into a lay-by and realised that the man I’d been with since a teenager – both of us virgins – had cheated on me with someone I knew. I was terribly hurt. I wanted to throw my wedding ring at him.’
Frank recalled: ‘When her husband asked to see Jacque on her own, I knew straight away. I thought, “Oh God.”’
After anguished discussions with their grown-up children, Jacque decided to forgive him and move on. But Jane’s husband had other ideas and, according to the Fulkers, could not come to terms with the idea that his wife had willingly slept with another man.
In March 2013, the Fulkers were astonished when two detectives turned up at their door and told them that Jane’s husband had made a complaint of rape. Frank told his story – and a log made by one of the detectives and disclosed during the trial concluded: ‘I am happy that there have not been any offences take place [sic]. It is clear from both parties that this was a brief affair which has only come to light again due to [Jane’s] decline in mental health.’ Feeling confident that the accusation had been dealt with, the Fulkers put the matter out of their minds. But in May 2015, Frank received a call from another Sussex detective, asking him to come in ‘for a chat’.
Mr Fulker said: ‘I was