A TEENAGER who raped a 47-year-old mum while awaiting trial for a similar sex attack was locked up for eight years today.
First offender Scott Graham, 19, had been freed on bail after appearing in court accused of forcing himself on a 16-year-old in a West Lothian college hostel.
Four months later, he forced the older woman into a bedroom at a house in Galashiels and
had sex with her.
At the High Court in Edinburgh a jury found Graham, of Roberts Grove, Galashiels, guilty – by majority – of both rape charges.
But when he returned to court to be sentenced today, defence QC Neil Murray said baker Graham still claimed he was innocent.
And the lawyer complained that background reports had branded Graham "a dangerous sexual predator."
Mr Murray continued: "He is not a person who considers himself, sexually, above women and uses them merely to gratify himself."
It was quite unusual for a court to have to deal with a young man of such promise and such good character facing such serious charges, he added.
Sending Graham to detention, judge Lord Philip said the second rape was "of a more serious nature" than the first and Graham was also on bail at the time. The judge made an order that his licence conditions should be extended by five years.
An earlier trial heard Graham's teenage victim tell how she went to a Christmas disco at Oatridge College, West Lothian, in December 2006 after drinking alcopops.
Graham was on placement at the college because, at the time, he was working as a greenkeeper for a golf club.
After the disco Graham came to the door of the room where the girl was staying – even though it was a girls only hostel.
The girl, now 17, said he kissed her and leaned against her, forcing her back onto a bed.
The girl said she was too scared to do anything. After Graham left she went outside for a cigarette and told a girlfriend what had happened.
Graham was charged with raping her and appeared at Linlithgow Sheriff Court last September.
Then in January this year he met the 47-year-old woman in a bar in Galashiels.
She told how she went back to her flat alone and was making a cup of tea when Graham arrived. She opened the door to find him standing there. "I think I froze," she told the trial.
In the bedroom he ignored her pleas to get off her and made her perform other sex acts as well as raping her.
Police were called to the house after the 47-year-old mum used her mobile phone to call her daughter.
"Why pick on me? I didn't know him. I was just shocked. Why would he come to my door?" she said during the trial.
"I wasn't happy to see him. I told him to get out of my house. I was just shocked at what happened to me."
She said she had now lost her confidence and was scared when she was away from home.
Graham claimed both women had been willing to have sex with him but the jury rejected his story.
