Rape victim's life in ruins, says mother
A distraught mother whose daughter was subjected to a sadistic double rape said tonight that the teenager’s life was in ruins.
The 15-year-old was brutally attacked twice by a man armed with a screwdriver while on holiday in west Belfast.
After the assault he used a stolen mobile phone stolen to call and text her mother at home in the north of England and gloat over what he had done.
As police in Belfast intensified their hunt for the rapist and a second man who forced three boys with the girl to watch the horrific ordeal, the victim’s mother told how she had been destroyed.
The woman, who has not been identified, said: “She’s not the same girl we sent over here.
“We sent over a lively, confident, bubbly teenage girl. And now she’s withdrawn and clingy and scared.”
The girl was dragged into an empty petrol station forecourt on Blacks Road and raped early on Saturday morning.
The three boys were stripped to the waist and beaten with an iron bar before all four were taken to a nearby golfing complex where a second vicious sex assault took place.
Elaine Captain, whose son was one of the youths beaten, today revealed a chilling warned issued by their captors.
“They said on their way into the golf course, ’This is where it’s going to get messy’.”
Her 15-year-old boy, who she has asked not to be named, had been chased home after breaking free and escaping.
“He was pursued by one of them and didn’t stop until he got to our back door, his face was scratched and swollen and his eyes were staring all over the place. I’ve never seen him traumatised like that,” recalled Mrs Captain.
“Everything was just blurted out in a garble, telling me he had just seen his friend raped and that she could be dead or stabbed now.”
The four victims, who had been staying together at one of their families’ homes, sneaked out unnoticed as the parents slept.
The girl’s mother demanded justice for what her daughter’s terrible suffering.
Pleading for those who know the rapist to give him up, she told BBC Radio Ulster: “I want these people to pay for what they’ve done.
“They are very distinctive. The descriptions are very detailed, somebody must know who they are. What sort of people would know who they are and say nothing?
“It’s not like they’ve done something minor. They put her through it twice and the boys she was with were forced to watch that.
“Where’s the humanity, what sort of people are they? Nothing that gets done is going to help these kids get back what they’ve lost.
“All four kids involved have lost their confidence, they’ve lost their dignity, they’ve lost a lot more than mobile phones and jewellery.
“I’m asking anybody that knows anything: ’Just give them something back and give any information that’s going to help’.”
Detectives hunting the pair, both thought to be in their late teens, have already arrested one man and later released him until further inquiries are carried out.
Phone records are also being examined in a bid to trace either of the two mobiles understood to have been stolen during the attack.
Police have urged the rapist and his accomplice to give themselves up. Their families were also challenged to bring them in if they suspected any involvement.
The rapist is believed to be about 5ft 8in, with a scar above his right eyebrow and chipped or decaying teeth.
The thug who beat the boys while he carried out his attack has his left ear pierced and wore at least one sovereign-type ring.
Eileen Calder of the Rape Crisis and Sexual Abuse Centre in Belfast said the attack was even more horrific than some of the worst sexual assaults carried out by paramilitary organisations and never reported to police.
“We come across a lot of very brutal rapes, some even at gunpoint, that never get to the authorities,” she said.
“But there was an element of sadism that was most shocking about this. Forcing boys to strip to the waist and getting them to watch.”
