Henry Blackshaw secured a conviction for a man who climbed through a window and tried to rape a woman as she slept.
Jack Braidwood of Nuneaton climbed through the woman’s basement window and attempted to rape her at her home in Chorlton. He had returned and broken into the address in the small hours, having been a visitor earlier that night. He was sentenced to nine years imprisonment, with a three year extension in the circumstance that the judge determined that he posed a danger to women.
The case concerned difficult issues surrounding consent arising from the defendant seeking to rely on the victim’s intoxication and confusion to “normalise” the situation after she had woken up whilst the offence was being committed.
In passing sentence the judge made reference to Henry’s description of Mr Braidwood during the trial as an “arrogant and narcissistic individual…who tried to cover his tracks with low cunning”.