Guilty, 30 years after horrific rape case

Robert Howard Carpenter pounced on the married 37-year-old as she walked along a desolate footpath in Scunthorpe to her job as a canteen assistant at the town's steelworks at 6.30am on Sunday, March 25, 1979.

He forced her scarf into her mouth to stop her screaming, savagely beat her and threw her over a fence.

She was found by a member of the public, distressed, shocked, bleeding from her mouth, badly bruised, with swelling to her face and her clothing dirty and bloodstained.

The case appalled police. A retired female detective, who worked on the initial investigation, revealed she was still troubled by it when she attended Grimsby Crown Court yesterday to see Carpenter, now 56, admit rape, another serious sexual offence and grievous bodily harm.

Det Supt Dena Fleming, head of Humberside Police's Major Incident Team (MIT), said she was "elated" by Carpenter's conviction for the horrific offence.

"The photographs held by Humberside Police, taken shortly after she was found, show a woman in a dreadful state with what can only be described as a haunted look on her face.

"This is something officers who worked on this case many years ago still remember.

"A detective sergeant who was involved with the original inquiry came to court and said it was one of the jobs she had never got over.

"Sadly, the victim died eight years after this horrendous crime, and so unfortunately will never know that the person responsible for attacking her has been arrested and sentenced 31 years later.

"That is a tragedy but her family, including her daughter, will hopefully take some comfort from the fact that justice has finally been done. My sympathy goes out to them."

Carpenter, who is now a grandfather, escaped justice for decades despite a large-scale police investigation.

He was eventually snared after forensic evidence taken from the victim in 1979 was matched to his profile on the national DNA database, which was launched in 1995.

Carpenter had only been out of prison for three weeks after serving three years for a serious assault when he was arrested for the rape on December 16 last year.

He has a string of convictions for violence and dishonesty dating from the 1970s, including attacking police and biting a nurse.

The case is one of several historical unsolved serious sex attacks being re-investigated by Humberside Police under Operation Fox, which

Mrs Fleming launched a year ago.

"In crimes such as this one the offender normally goes on to have a life; the victim, however, has to live with what has happened, trying to rebuild and make some sort of life," she said.

"Carpenter, for example, has been married, had children and grandchildren.

"I want to make sure that through Operation Fox these offenders of the most horrendous kind are brought to justice."

Mrs Fleming added that other cases were being worked on.

Operation Fox achieved its first major breakthrough in August last year when Paul Dook, 45, was jailed for seven years for the rape of a 22-year-old woman in a secluded layby in the East Riding 18 years earlier.

Carpenter is due to be sentenced on June 14.