Kenya benefactor guilty of sex crimes against '˜most vulnerable'

Keith Morris used his elevated status among villagers in Kilifi County to groom young girls by taking them on day trips, buying them meals out and letting them stay in hotel rooms with him.

The 72-year-old repeatedly visited Kenya with family members over a period of about 20 years, attaining the status of a “patriarchal figure” among the people of a small village by paying for the medical treatment and education of some locals, Leeds Crown Court heard.

Prosecutors said Morris would take girls away with him to hotels and, when challenged by staff, produced interim guardianship orders he had attempted to attain for the children.

Whilst in the hotel rooms, the father-of-three would sexually abuse his two under-age victims, one of whom had recently lost her father and was described as the “weakest of the girls in the village” by a judge.

The abuse only stopped when Morris was arrested in February 2017 after a fellow British tourist grew suspicious of his demeanour around the children.

He was convicted of four counts of rape, four of assault, two of sexual assault and two of perverting the course of justice, and banned from unsupervised contact with under-age girls.

Judge Mairs told him: “There is no doubt that you used your elevated and financially powerful position to access the girls. You preyed upon the most vulnerable of the most vulnerable.

Morris’s lawyer, Caroline Wigan, said her client “does not accept the verdicts of the jury”.