The Press and Journal (Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire)
Ex-golfer dies still trying to clear rape conviction
Justice: Repeated court appeals failed
A convicted rapist who spent 15 years attempting to clear his name has died. Former professional golfer Graham Gordon, 57, was jailed for five years after he was found guilty of raping a woman he met in an Aberdeen nightclub. The trial heard he attacked the woman after taking her to his home in Bridge of Don.
A convicted rapist who spent 15 years attempting to clear his name has died.
Former professional golfer Graham Gordon, 57, was jailed for five years after he was found guilty of raping a woman he met in an Aberdeen nightclub.
The trial heard he attacked the woman, who was 43 at the time, after taking her back to his home in Bridge of Don but Gordon always maintained his innocence.
He told the jury the woman was a willing partner but admitted he could not fully remember the events because he had slept with 15 partners in the previous fortnight, and at least 32 in the three months before the attack in 2001.
He served three years and four months behind bars after he was sentenced at Stonehaven High Court the following year.
He then launched an appeal to overturn his conviction, claiming he had defective representation, but it was rejected in 2004. The following year he represented himself at a hearing of the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) in a bid to have his case re-opened, claiming police inquiry errors undermined the fairness of his original trial.
It was passed to the High Court but not upheld.
The case was presented to the SCCRC again in 2011, and it ruled that reopening the case would not be in the interests of justice due to the length of time which had passed since his conviction.
It did admit however that Gordon “may” have
“I will not rest until I get justice. It’s one big whitewash”
suffered a miscarriage of justice.
Last year he unsuccessfully sued the Scottish Government and SCCRC for nearly £700,000 for “gross negligence” in the way his appeal case was handled.
A further bid by Gordon to clear his name was unanimously rejected by the Supreme Court in March.
He then vowed to take the case to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, adding he had received a report from a forensic expert with “concerns” about the case.
At the time he said: “How can there possibly be anything certain or final about a person who may have suffered a miscarriage of justice?
“I will not rest until I get justice. It’s one big whitewash.”
Gordon was 57 years old when he died of cancer at Roxburghe House on Tuesday, October 31.
He was cremated earlier this week.