Supporters of a former taxi driver who dragged a teenage girl into his apartment and pinned her down during a terrifying attack wept as he was jailed.
A woman watching from the public gallery yelled ‘no’ and screamed as John Stanley received an 11-year prison sentence, of which at least seven must be served behind bars. The 35-year-old man tricked the 17-year-old girl into her car in 2018 and then forced her into her apartment before suffocating her on her bed. She was only able to escape after hitting him in the head and running out of the flat.
Stanley denied false imprisonment but was convicted by a jury at Liverpool Crown Court earlier this year. Yesterday, at his sentencing hearing, the court heard how he coaxed the girl into her car in the early hours of October 3, 2018, along with a friend and an unidentified man with whom they had been speaking.
READ MORE:A man dragged a 17-year-old girl into an apartment and pinned her to the bed by her neck.
He told her he needed help getting home, and she later told police that she tried to help him despite feeling uncomfortable. However, when Stanley left the club, he quickly left the girl’s friend and the other man separately and then took the girl to a flat.
She protested all the way, begged him to call her a taxi, and said she wanted to leave. He ignored her, dragging her by the head into her apartment and locking them both inside her.
After she refused a sexual advance, he pinned her to the bed and strangled her until she used a high heel to hit him. She then managed to find the keys to the flat and escape.
Despite CCTV evidence showing Stanley, the girl, her friend and the other man getting into his car, he denied meeting her that night. While the girl had initially been unable to tell police who attacked her, officers traced her car registration to Stanley and later confirmed her identity as the man who attacked her.
Jurors saw through him and convicted him of false imprisonment in May. Later, Stanley seemed to admit to some of what had happened in the probation service interviews, though not all of what the girl said.
Judge Brian Cummings, QC, said the timeline of events described by the girl was the whole truth and criticized Stanley for “playing down” what he had done even after he was found guilty. Referring to the evidence provided by the girl and the police, Judge Cummings said: “Those are the real facts of the case, not the false and downplaying version you gave in the pre-sentence report. It was a completely terrifying ordeal for the victim.”
Judge Cummings said that Stanley posed a threat to the public and gave him an extended sentence of 11 years. He will have to serve a minimum of seven years in custody before being eligible for parole. Two Stanley supporters watching from the public gallery were upset when the judge handed down his sentence. One woman immediately began to cry when a visibly angry man comforted her.
Judge Cummings temporarily halted the sentence after the backlash. He said: “I know tensions are running high, but I must be able to continue sentencing without interruption.”
The couple then left court, though the man later returned to hear the rest of Stanley’s sentence, which includes a restraining order that prevents him from contacting the victim and a criminal conduct order that means he would have to notify sentencing authorities before looking for certain types. Of employment.
Reference-www.liverpoolecho.co.uk