Sexual abuse man jailed

Chris Willmott

01 July

A MAN who sexually abused a young girl during visits to her Solihull home more than 30 years ago has been jailed for two years.
Rupert St John Rowbotham had pleaded guilty at Warwick Crown Court to five charges of indecently assaulting the girl in the 70’s when she was aged between six and eight.
Jailing Rowbotham (62) of Wantage, Oxfordshire, the judge also ordered him to register as a sex offender for ten years.
Prosecutor Andrew Wallace said the victim, who is now in her 40’s, lived with her parents in Solihull, and in the 70’s Rowbotham would visit their home.
The first occasion he admitted was when he was at her home in Solihull when she was six.
Further similar indecent assaults took place during visits to the girl’s family and, Rowbotham accepted, on three or four occasions when they visited him at his home.
After she finally went to the police last year the victim said those acts ‘really hurt sometimes.’
He once abused her and told her ‘you’re really going to like this,’ and in a statement the woman said: “After that, every time someone said that to me it made me cry.”
Since then she has suffered stress-related complaints as a result of the abuse – and has a phobia about people who, like Rowbotham, have a gap between their front teeth.
She had disclosed the abuse to her parents in the 80’s, prompted by the setting up of Childline, and her father challenged Rowbotham, who admitted what he had done.
But the police were not informed until she finally reported the abuse last year and Rowbotham, who had no previous convictions, was arrested, added Mr Wallace.
Nicholas Syfret QC, defending, pointed out that the maximum sentence for the offences at the time was five years – and sentences of up to two years could be suspended.
Judge Trevor Faber read references which had been handed in by Mr Syfret, but said: “In all other respects this is a man who has led a blameless and positively good life; but all of that pales against offending of this kind.”
Urging the judge not to pass an immediate prison sentence, Mr Syfret argued that Rowbotham’s pleas at the first opportunity, the time since the offence and the fact that he had admitted it when confronted in the 80’s were mitigating factors which could lead to the sentence being suspended.
Jailing Rowbotham, Judge Trevor Faber told him: “The abuse you heaped on her and the breach of trust these offences involved is significant.
"This was a gross breach of trust, and I have to bear in mind the effect on your victim.”