HUGGINS:12 YEARS FOR RAPIST WHO ATTACKED SAME STRANGER TWICE IN 3 MONTHS

A rapist who put a stranger through ‘every woman’s worst nightmare’ when he attacked her twice in three months was jailed for 12 years today (mon).

O’Nile Huggins, 21, first struck in April last year after dragging the 23-year-old woman to the ground near his home in south London.

The woman chose not to report her ordeal to police but realised she had made a ‘terrible mistake’ when he raped her again three months later.

As a result of the ‘prolonged, terrifying, and emotionally damaging’ ordeal, she has moved home and changed her job.

Huggins was traced from an e-fit image created with the victim’s help and published in a national appeal.

His DNA also matched a sample taken from the victim.

When his home in Stockwell was searched, officers found hundreds of unused condoms.

A doctor’s report produced in court said he believed the victim was his girlfriend.

Huggins, who suffers from a mild learning disorder, was convicted of two charges of rape after a trial at Inner London Crown Court in June this year, but continues to deny his guilt.

The rapist showed no reaction to his fate as Judge Roger Chapple told him: ‘On 13 April last year you victim was walking home when you attacked her.

‘You pulled her off the street into a garden and raped her.

‘You and she were complete strangers.

‘It was described at the trial as ‘every woman’s worst nightmare’.

‘You raped her again as she was walking along the street during the hours of darkness on 14 July.

‘It follows, it seems to me, that on the second occasion there was a degree of timing.

‘This wasn’t sophisticated planning – you weren’t capable of that.

‘On both occasions her ordeal was prolonged, terrifying and emotionally damaging.

‘It is a terrible thing for  a woman to be raped once.

‘It is simply appalling that the same woman should be raped a second time three months later, by the same man, at a time whan she was no doubt still coming to terms with the first one.

‘It is hardly surprising that the effect on her has been profound.

‘She gave up her job that she enjoyed so that she did not have to walk home during the hours of darkness.

‘She’s had to move home.

‘Her relationship suffered.

‘She has an inability to trust others.

‘Her sleep was disturbed, she suffers nightmares, her confidence was understandably adversely affected.’

In the first attack, Huggins approached the woman as she walked home from a bus stop in Stockwell Road and ‘tried to engage her in conversation,’ said the prosecutor.

‘She politely gave him the brush-off but he persisted and began to try and kiss her.

‘Suddenly he grabbed her and forced her towards the side of a house.’

He then toppled her to the floor and raped her.

Eventually he got up and was friendly towards her, seeming to ‘believe that they had a pleasant evening out together and even mentioned seeing her again’, added Mr Cavin.

‘He stood there watching as the victim pulled her clothes together and began to tell her how nice it had been for him and tried to hiss her again.’

He put his arm around her and as they walked along the victim made a vain attempt to call 999, while pretending she was not and saying: ‘Hello mum.’

The prosecutor said it was ‘an unfortunate aspect of this case’ that the operator did not realise it was a cry for help and hung up thinking it was a crossed line.

The woman told the attacker she was nearly home and he left her.

She spoke to her flatmate who advised her to call police but she decided not to, partly due to the desire to forget, said Mr Cavin.

‘Her decision not to report is understandable,’ he added.

‘It was perhaps the product of two different factors. Firstly the shock. Secondly she is a woman of some strength.

‘Without in anyway seeking to criticise her for that decision, events were to prove that it was an understandable but terrible mistake.’

The victim was on her way home from a party in the early hours of July 14 when she suffered the ‘sheer terror’ of spotting Huggins again.

‘She got off the bus and began to walk home,’ said the barrister.

‘At which point she saw this defendant walking towards her.

‘You can imagine what was going through her mind – the sheer terror.

‘He immediately walked up to her and put his hand around her waist.’

Just as before, she kept walking as he continued in a ‘chatty friendly mood’.

Huggins told her: ‘You’re pretty,’ and ‘Don’t worry.’

‘She kept thinking the only option when the opportunity rose, was to run off.’

She told officers she wanted to scream and try and escape but: ‘I thought: ‘I don’t want to make the situation worse. If I run and he catches me, what will he do?’

The prosecutor said: ‘Then his overt friendliness switched to sexual violence.’

He yanked down her trousers and started raping her.

Afterwards he became friendly again and let her go.

She called the same friend as after the first attack and this time the shaken victim let her ring 999.

Huggins was arrested on October 9 after patrolling police recognised him in the street from the e-fit image.

He refused to answer questions in interview but has since claimed in a defence statement that she was willing.

Following his conviction on June, Huggins has been interviewed by psychologists and psychiatrists for a series of assessments of his mental state.

One doctor’s report said: ‘He believes the victim was his girlfriend.

‘He believed the victim wanted to have sexual intercourse with him and is not able to entertain the idea she was too scared to resist.’

Consultant psychiatrist Dene Robertson said Huggins had never had a girlfriend and had problems developing intimate relationships with others as a result of his learning difficulty.

‘His first experience of sexual intercourse was the rape of his victim,’ he wrote.

The rapist had also shown ‘extreme ‘extreme minimisation’ of the incident, saying he had even bought the woman a drink, said Dr Robertson, of the Maudsley Hospital.

Judge Chapple concluded Huggins’ actions were ‘deliberate and intentional’ and his sentence should not be served in hospital.

He added: ‘Nevertheless I don’t ignore your learning disability.

‘It will be a determinate sentence. It will be a long one.’

The judge expressed ‘disappointment’ that during the 399 days he has spent in custody he has had little help for his difficulties, but added that he hoped that would now begin ‘in earnest’.
 
Huggins, of Mawbey Street, Stockwell, southwest London, was convicted of one charge of rape between April 10 and 20 last year, and one on July 14.

The defendant was assisted in the dock by an ‘intermediary’ during the proceedings.
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