Torment Of Rape Victim Whose Attacker Struck Just Two Days After Being Relesed Early From Jail!

Ordeal: The woman thought she was going to be killed

Torment of rape victim whose attacker struck just two days after being released early from jail

A convicted criminal raped a female jogger at knife-point in a nine-hour ordeal just two days after he had been freed early from prison on licence.
Peter Watton, 37, was freed despite having 26 convictions for more than 130 offences, including attempted kidnap of a young woman.
Just 48 hours later he abducted the 44-year-old woman and subjected her to a sickening attack in which she thought she would die.
After lying in wait in woodland close to the Duke of Westminster’s estate in Chester, he pounced on the attractive brunette in broad daylight, before threatening her with a knife, tying her up, and repeatedly raping her.
She managed to escape at midnight after running in the pitch black to  a nearby house when he had his  trousers round his knees.
Yesterday as heavily-tattooed Watton was jailed for 20 years, his victim told the Daily Mail that she felt ‘let down’ by the justice system that had freed him prematurely and given him the opportunity to attack.
‘No sentence he is given will ever change what’s happened to me,’ the receptionist, who is engaged to be married, said.
‘I feel very, very lucky to be alive. It was a terrifying, degrading experience. I battle with the memory of what  happened every day and nothing will ever be the same again.

 

‘A decision was made to release him and that needs to be questioned, he shouldn’t have been free.
There should be measures put in place to stop  dangerous criminals being released automatically halfway through their sentence.’
She added: ‘My challenge is to cope with what’s happened and not let it ruin my life. If I let this dominate the next 40 years then I won’t have lived, it will be me that’s been imprisoned.
‘He is a dangerous man and all that matters is that he is no longer free to go on and do this to someone else.’

Dangerous: Peter Watton, pictured, was freed despite having 26 convictions included attempting to kidnap a woman

Chester Crown Court heard that  her ordeal began shortly after 3pm on June 14 last year when Watton attacked her while she was running with her spaniel dog along Duke’s Drive, a public footpath, which runs close to the River Dee.

The 6ft 3ins convict shoved her into woodland and told her: ‘I’ve been watching you for two weeks. I know where you live. If you say anything to anyone I’ll hurt you and hurt your family.’

She said: ‘One minute I was running along the footpath, the next I was being taken off into the woods. He had his arm around my neck in a headlock and was much stronger than me. I was in shock, I felt like it wasn’t real, but it was.’
He tied her up then ordered her to strip naked and began a series of humiliating sexual attacks, which led to him being charged with eight counts of rape, two of assault, one of false imprisonment and possession of a knife.
‘I was terrified and just froze,’ the woman said. ‘I was pleading with him over and over, saying, “Don’t hurt me, don’t hurt me”. I just didn’t want to believe it was happening to me. I was petrified.’

The woman, who still suffers nightmares, said her ‘survival instincts’ took over.
She kept telling Watton, who kept his face obscured with a scarf, that she couldn’t identify him in the hope that he would let her go, and left a trail of her clothes for police to find should she not make it out alive.
She said: ‘I thought to myself “Is this how my life ends?”.’

She eventually escaped and told police her attacker had a tattoo ‘Pete’ on his knuckles. He was caught five days later. He claimed the sex was consensual after a ‘brief passionate encounter’ but the jury dismissed his ‘ludicrous’ account and found him guilty after a four-day trial last month.

Judge Elgan Edwards handed Watton, who refused to enter the dock to hear his fate, an extended sentence, which means he must serve two thirds of his 20-year term before being eligible for release. 

He will spend his first four years of freedom on a strict licence.
‘This is the worst case of rape I’ve ever had the misfortune to come across,’ the judge said. ‘I’ve not a shadow of a doubt that Peter Watton is a very dangerous man.’

The court heard Watton had been freed on licence from HMP Risley, in Warrington, two days before the attack after serving three years of a six-year sentence for kidnap and robbery.

Under the Criminal Justice Act 2003, anyone serving a sentence of 12 months or more is automatically released on licence mid-way through.

His previous convictions –including one from 2000, when he was jailed for six years for attempted kidnap of a young woman – was not deemed  serious or relevant enough to keep him inside.