Man got £90 taxi from Cardiff to Swansea before raping underage girl


A man on a night out got a £90 taxi from Cardiff to Swansea to meet two underage girls before raping one of them.

Paul Clement’s teenage victim told police after the incident how he had pinned her arms back prompting her eventually to “give up”.
She said: “It was going to happen, there is no point in trying to stop it now.
“He had already decided that ‘no’ was not the answer for him so what was the point?”

The 39-year-old had been on a night out in Cardiff with friend William L’Homme, 33, on the night of May 24, 2017, a court heard. The pair had spent the hours before heading to Swansea messaging the teenage girls, whom they had never met, via a social media messaging app. Swansea Crown Court heard the pair met up with the two teenage girls who led them into the grounds of a school.

Clement, a jury heard, was “being pushy” by asking one of the girls to perform a number of sex acts on him. He exposed himself to her and attempted to force her to perform a sex act but the girl “refused to get involved in anything sexual with a man considerably older than her”.

Prosecutor Andrew Davies said Clement had said: “Come on. She [the alleged victim’s friend] promised and she is not doing anything.

“You can’t do that as well. That is not fair. We have come all the way down here and spent £90 on a taxi and it is for nothing.”

The court was told the girl then went for a walk with Clement at which point he raped her.

During a police interview following his arrest Clement told officers he could not remember what messages had been exchanged between himself and the girls but admitted “it must have been something sexual to leave Cardiff and go to Swansea”.

He also added in his interview: “I thought my luck was in… I asked William to come with me. I did not want to go on my own. It is a long way to go on your own.

“It was the early hours of the morning, it could have been a set-up, someone trying to get me there, trying to mug me, beat me up or whatever, so I did not go on my own.”

Clement, of Richard Street in Maerdy, Rhondda, denied rape and two counts of sexual assault but on Friday was found guilty by a jury of all three counts.

L’Homme, 33 and also of Richard Street in Maerdy, was found not guilty of causing or inciting a girl under the age of 16 to engage in sexual activity after denying the charge.

After the verdicts were announced Clement began hyperventilating in the dock and Judge Peter Heywood ordered he should be taken immediately for medical attention.

He will be sentenced at a later date.