A BRITISH tourist has been handed a four-year prison sentence after confessing to raping his son’s female friend in a Magaluf hotel room.
Spanish state prosecutors had wanted the Brit dad, 43, to be jailed for nine years if convicted of the sex attack that took place last May.
SolarpixThe Brit entered a plea bargain ahead of the trial that began today[/caption]
The man struck a plea bargain deal through his lawyer ahead of the full trial at the Audiencia Court in the Majorcan capital Palma this morning.
It was confirmed he would receive a four-year prison sentence during a subsequent brief public hearing.
The fact he was ‘very drunk’ when he attacked his victim, a British woman understood to be in her twenties, was taken into account as a mitigating factor.
He will be expelled from Spain once he has completed half of his sentence.
Prosecutors outlined in a pre-trial indictment how the British man agreed to let the young woman stay in their room on May 9, 2023, after his son got chatting to her around their holiday hotel pool.
They said the accused “with the intention of satisfying sexual desire and taking advantage of the fact his victim had consumed a large amount of alcohol and was in a deep sleep on a sofa bed” went onto rape her.
They alleged that she woke up, began shouting at him to stop but he continued.
Police were alerted after she fled the unnamed hotel and raised the alarm at a Civil Guard office.
“The woman subsequently went to a medical centre and was very emotionally affected and in a depressed state,” prosecutors said, adding that bruises were found on her body.
The suspect was arrested at Palma Airport after packing his bags and trying to leave the island early.
He was thrown in jail following a court remand hearing and has been held behind bars since then.
As well as serving a four-year prison sentence he is also paying his victim £6,400 in compensation as part of the plea bargain deal.
Local reports at the time of his arrest said police took a statement from the rape victim before going to the unnamed Magaluf hotel where the sex attack took place and finding the man they were looking for had already checked out of the hotel.
He was arrested at his flight boarding gate.
An investigating magistrate ordered his remand in jail after he was hauled to court for questioning during a closed session in which the British woman gave her version of events.
It is not yet clear where the self-confessed rapist will serve his time in jail and time he has already spent behind bars will be taken into account in his sentencing.
Prior to the plea bargain, prosecutors had wanted a nine-year prison sentence and for the accused rapist to pay his alleged victim £8,700 in compensation.
The party resorts of Magaluf and S’Arenal east of the island capital were rocked last summer by several alleged sex attacks involving foreign tourists, including gang rapes.
A British 18-year-old was allegedly gang-raped at a hotel in Magaluf in the early hours of August 14.
Five French nationals and a Swiss man were arrested and remanded in jail pending an ongoing judicial investigation and a further two suspects subsequently held in France on European Arrest Warrants.
Not long after their arrests, three Brit tourists were arrested in Magaluf over another alleged gang-rape of a UK woman on August 25.
Two of the men were being investigated on suspicion of raping the British woman and the third on suspicion of doing nothing to prevent the sex attack.
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