Life for the smirking rapist who was cleared five times

Stephen Crawford, who greeted each acquittal with a smirk, was repeatedly released to walk the streets.

But yesterday a jury convicted the sexual predator of attacking three women he lured into his car by posing as a taxi driver.

Scroll down for more

Crawford, 44, who was described as a "ruthless hunter", targeted lone women after they became separated from friends.

Protesting his innocence, he forced his victims to relive their terrifying experience in court.

He told the jury that they consented to any sex that took place and had appeared to "enjoy" it.

What the jury was not told, however, was details of Crawford's record of alleged attacks.

Between 1985 and 1993, he stood trial on five occasions charged with rape.

Each time he claimed that they consented to sex and with it being their word against his, one by one the cases against him crumbled.

His first acquittal came in 1985 when prosecutors agreed to drop the rape allegation made by a 15-year-old if he pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of unlawful sex.

In June 1992, he was found not guilty of raping an 18-year-old to whom he had offered a lift in his camper van.

Again, he claimed she consented.

At the same time, a charge of raping another woman was dropped after prosecutors offered no evidence.

In September 1992, he was again cleared by a jury of raping a woman in his car after offering her a lift home.

Then, in March 1993, a fifth rape charge was dropped when an offduty special constable who had made the claim decided not to give evidence against him.

Crawford, who was jailed in 1994 for 21 months for unlawful sex with a 13-year-old and given a suspended sentence in 1999 for attacking a 15-year-old girl, had twice failed to comply with the requirements of the Sex Offenders' Register.

Newcastle Crown Court heard how between September 2005 and September 2006 his three latest victims, two aged 17 and one 22, took lifts from him in Durham, Sunderland and Newcastle.

He then drove them to secluded areas where he indecently assaulted two and raped a third.

Yesterday, sentencing Crawford to four life sentences, Judge Tony Lancaster told him:

"You are an undoubted danger to young women and a sexual predator. You targeted these three women in order to satisfy your lust upon them.

"All three women in my view must have been terrified of you and one could see in court how they had to relive their ordeal when they gave their evidence before the jury."

One of them broke down as she told the jury of the ordeal she suffered while imprisoned in Crawford's car.

The 17-year-old said: "He climbed over from the driver's seat on to the passenger seat. He was on top of me. He told me to kiss him. I was saying 'stop it, stop it'. I couldn't breathe."

His final victim, also 17, became separated from friends during a night out in Newcastle and accepted a lift from Crawford, who showed her what she believed to be his ID card as a taxi driver.

The court heard how Crawford raped her as she repeatedly shouted "no". She showed him pictures of her family, begging him to look at their faces to imagine how they would suffer if he killed her.

Crawford, from Chilton, County Durham, was found guilty of rape, false imprisonment and four sexual assaults.

One of the women he was cleared of raping in the early Nineties had previously warned of the danger he posed.

At the time, she said: "He is a ruthless hunter who will strike again. How many more women can he possibly harm before he is stopped?"