ABHORRENT
...that’s what a woman drugged by the black cab rapist calls his crime – so why, she wants to know, has he been freed?
A WOMAN who escaped from black cab rapist John Worboys after he drugged her with champagne laced with sedatives has spoken of her outrage at his release from prison.
It comes as Ministers last night announced a review of the parole process – and an investigation into the system for alerting victims to an offender’s release.
Worboys, Britain’s worst serial sex offender, was jailed in 2009 for drugging and sexually assaulting 12 passengers. But more than 100 women came forward to say he had targeted them, and detectives suspect him of carrying out more than 500 attacks. He was given an indeterminate sentence, with a minimum term of eight years.
As the outcry grew yesterday over the decision to free him after just nine years, the woman recalled her terrifying encounter – and warned that he is likely to strike again.
She said: ‘I don’t know how he has managed to persuade people that he’s a reformed character, not after that many crimes.’
The woman, then aged 30, was on her way home with a female friend in 2008 when she hailed Worboys’s cab at 2am. ‘I was complaining that I had lost my phone, which he overheard,’ she revealed.
‘My friend told him that we should drop me off first. He refused but his argument made sense in terms of the route. He was a black cab driver so I trusted him.’
The friend spotted bottles of champagne in the footwell as she got out of the taxi. ‘She phoned my husband and said, “I know this sounds ridiculous but I’m really worried. It’s a black cab but something just doesn’t feel right”.’
Former stripper Worboys, now 60, started telling the victim, from West London, about winning tens of thousands of pounds at a casino, and asked if she would have a drink with him to celebrate.
She said: ‘I said I didn’t want to but then he pulled over in a really dark residential street.
‘I didn’t know where I was so I went along with it because I didn’t know what else to do.
It was terrifying. I kept thinking, “If I’m nice to him, he will take me home”.’
Worboys got in the back and handed her some champagne but she spotted a tablet in the bottom of the glass. She said: ‘I tried to spill as much of it as possible when he wasn’t looking, but I did have to drink some to toast his win.’ She then began to black out.
She added: ‘I don’t remember what happened in the back seat. He could potentially have done something to me but I don’t know.’
The next thing the woman remembers is driving towards her house. ‘When we were coming down my road, he said, “Let’s just have another drink to celebrate.” He wanted to go down this really dark, dead end close to my home.
‘I said, “No, just take me home.” At that moment I saw my husband in the street. I was like, “That’s my husband!” – he couldn’t get me out of the cab fast enough.’
Now a mother of two, she gave evidence at Worboys’s trial, where he was found guilty of drugging her with intent. She said: ‘I think everyone thought that what he had done was so abhorrent, no one was going to let him out so quickly.’
Nearly 60 Labour, Lib Dem and Plaid Cymru MPs have written to Justice Secretary David Lidington asking if victims had the chance to appeal before the Parole Board authorised the release.
Announcing a review of the system, Mr Lidington said yesterday: ‘I believe that there is a strong case to review how to allow greater openness about the decisionmaking process.’
‘Pulled over in a dark residential street’