Guilty of sex attack on girl

Published on Friday 28 June 2002 01:00

A FATHER-OF-FIVE has been convicted of trying to rape an 11-year-old girl just one hour after carrying out another sex attack.

The schoolgirl, grabbed as she walked home after a dance class, could not identify the tormentor who subjected her to a horrific sex ordeal - then handed her 20 - near Newington Library.

She had told the High Court in Edinburgh: "He gave me some money. I understood he was using me as, like, a prostitute."

The earlier victim - an 18-year-old nursing assistant who was dragged into bushes after she left Edinburgh’s Cameron Toll shopping centre - could not identify the man in dark clothing who "came from nowhere" and clapped a hand over her mouth.

The struggle in the bushes was featured on BBC’s Crimewatch programme as Lothian and Borders Police appealed for help in tracking down the attacker.

But it was DNA evidence which finally pinned the blame on Glasgow-born John Bermingham.

The jury was told that the chances of a mistake or coincidence with the evidence were a billion to one against.

After a trial lasting more than three weeks, it took a jury three-and-a-half hours to find the 35-year-old guilty of attempted rape, and assault with intent to rape.

The six men and nine women rejected Bermingham’s claim that he was in Glasgow selling stolen antiques on November 4, 2000, the day of the sex attacks.

They also found him guilty of driving dangerously and under the influence of alcohol during a 30-mile high-speed chase which led to his arrest a year later, as well as possession of a knife in his car.

During the trial, other charges against Bermingham were dropped.

He was cleared of raping a 15-year-old girl, indecency with a ten-year-old girl and spying on a 12-year-old girl as she undressed for bed.

A charge of raping the 11-year-old was reduced to one of attempted rape, for legal reasons, after the jury had heard her evidence.

None of the victims can be identified for legal reasons.

The schoolgirl seized near Newington Library - who is now 12 years old - was allowed to give her evidence over a CCTV link to a courtroom cleared of members of the public.

Judge Lord Hamilton and the lawyers took off their wigs and gowns to create a more informal atmosphere.

The youngster then described how she had bought chips and was walking home when she heard footsteps. "A man came from behind me and put his hand round my mouth," she said.

Her attacker told her to drop her chips and climb over a wall before forcing her on to a grassy area.

She said: "I was really scared. I was trying to scream, but his hand was muffling my noise."

The man opened her rucksack and took out her dance clothes, which he scattered on the ground, asking if she was good at dancing.

The girl said she was scared as she was told to take off her clothes, but she did so and lay down on her back, as the man had demanded.

"I kept asking him to let me go because my parents were having a dinner party that night and I said I needed to get home."

The court heard how her attacker also made her get on to her hands and knees.

"I felt him trying to have sexual intercourse," she said.

The girl added that when she was able to dress again, the man told her to face a wall and stay there for ten minutes after he left.

"He said that when I went home, if I called the police he would come after me."

Shortly after the incident in the grounds of the library, the frightened youngster was found by her mum, who had been driving around the streets looking for her.

The girl added: "She stopped and I got in. I felt that I was back with my family. I said that I had been raped."

The girl told the court that since the incident she had been scared to sleep in the dark and was "a lot more wary" when she went out.

The jury also heard a tearful teenager tell how she screamed and fought when a stranger dragged her into bushes near the Cameron Toll shopping centre.

The nursing assistant, now 19, told how they had both fallen to the ground and then the man had lain on top of her.

She told the court: "He was saying things like ‘I am not going to hurt you. I just want you to do something for me’.

"Then, when my screaming was getting louder, he was saying things like ‘I will stab you, I will kill you. Just shut up’."

The sobbing woman told the court that she was on her hands and knees trying to crawl out of the bushes when the man grabbed her and lay on top of her, with his hand over her mouth.

"There were people walking past, and he was saying ‘Oh, you’re drunk’ as if we were having an argument.

"I couldn’t say anything because his hand was over my mouth."

She told how her attacker was startled by someone shouting, and then tried to grab the collar of her jacket but grabbed her scarf instead.

"I ran and my scarf just unravelled," she said.

Lord Hamilton added Bermingham’s name to the sex offenders’ register and told him: "Having regard to the gravity of your conviction . . . I shall require to give the most careful consideration to what is the most appropriate disposal in the public interest."

The judge called for a risk assessment of the danger that Bermingham posed to the public and remanded him in custody.

He is due to be sentenced in Glasgow next month.