Teenage girl raped in dimly-lit Leeds park after drinking session, then told it was a 'dream'
A rapist who forced a drunk teenage girl into sex in a dimly-lit park, then told her it was a dream, has been jailed for more than three years.
Toby Nixon was found guilty after trial at Leeds Crown Court for the attack more than three years ago in Millenium Field in Wetherby.
Nixon, who was 17 at the time and is now 21, was convicted of one count but cleared of three other sexual offences. He was jailed for 42 months this week.
The court had heard that Nixon, of Parsons Green, Wetherby, had been out drinking with others in February 2021 and met the victim.
In the early hours of February 16 he walked the girl home but when they reached the park off Barleyfields Court, they sat on a bench.
During the trial it was heard that the girl had been consuming vodka and had already fallen asleep earlier in the evening. The judge said she was “showing all the signs of being extremely drunk”.
It was heard that Nixon later tried to convince the victim that the incident on the bench had not happened, that it was perhaps a dream.
Mitigating, Jessica Randall said there were clearly “question marks” over Nixon’s own intoxication, along with the victim, which may explain why the jury cleared him of three three other charges. She said it was “perhaps a step too far during that incident”, that the lines of consent were blurred.
She said that the judge could take and “exceptional course of action” and give Nixon a suspended sentence. She pointed to his lack of previous convictions and that he had not been in trouble since.
However, she said: “He has come to court entirely prepared for a custodial sentence. He is absolutely under no illusions about what can happen today.”
But the judge, Recorder David Gordon told Nixon: “She was isolated in a park late at night where she was particularly vulnerable.
“You took some steps to press her not to report the incident, that whatever recollection she had was nothing but a bad dream.
“I accept that you now deeply regret your behaviour on the night in question.”
Jailing him, he said that Nixon must remain on the sex offender register for life, and gave him a life-long restraining order.