Rapist ‘drugged himself’ after victim recognised him and swapped spiked drink

Knox viewed the woman 'as an easy touch'.

A rapist ‘ended up essentially drugging himself’ when his victim clocked his plan to spike her and swapped their drinks around.

Kevin Knox, 33, had raped the woman months earlier as she lay on her bed unable to resist after he’d spike her drink with sleeping tablets.

But this time she was ready and waiting to take ‘matters into her own hands’ in order to put her attacker behind bars.

The woman, who is entitled to lifelong anonymity, first met Knox through the AdultWork website where she advertised her services as an escort.

Knox, of Maplewood in Kirkby, posed as a ‘potential client’ and agreed to ‘pay her a sum of money in return for sex’, according to Gareth Roberts, prosecuting.

The price they settled on was £1,750, but Knox had ‘no intention of paying’, Mr Roberts told the trial Liverpool Crown Court.

In August last year, Knox visited her flat ‘intending to have sex, whether she liked it or not and whether he was able to pay or not’.

Once there, he slipped a sleeping tablet called zopiclone into the woman’s drink, leaving her ‘feeling extremely groggy’ and ‘rendering her pretty much incapable’.

He then ‘forcefully’ raped her on her bed, the Liverpool Echo reported.

Seeing her ‘as an easy touch’, Knox decided to do ‘exactly the same thing’ just two months later in November.

Knox used a different phone number and called himself ‘Danny’, but the woman saw right through his disguise.

Recognising him as her attacker, the woman ‘decided to take matters into her own hands’.

‘This time, in a strange turn of events, he ended up essentially drugging himself’, Mr Roberts told the jury.

When Knox poured the pair a drink, she swapped around the glasses so he would consume the one he’d spiked.

Once he had ‘started to demonstrate signs of having been drugged’, she dropped him off at a petrol station.

But in a further twist, he then showed up at her now-empty flat, where he broke in by smashing a window and stole a knife from her kitchen.

Police found him ‘wandering about in a communal area’ and stumbling around’ with the knife when they arrived on the scene.

Zopiclone was found in his system after his arrest – the very same drug that had been discovered in the woman’s system after he first attacked.

Her quick-thinking two months before meant traces of semen had recovered by swabs taken from her, and these were later matched with Knox.

None of Knox’s four prior convictions were for sexual offences, Robert Wyn Jones, appearing for the prosecution yesterday, told the court.

But his ‘sexually exploitative behaviour towards adolescents and young females’ and his ‘inappropriate sexual interests’ did land him with a sexual risk order in 2016.

Simon Christie, defending, told the court: ‘It is of note that his antecedents are for different matters.

‘His only sentence of imprisonment was in September 2016, when he received four months for a wholly different matter.

‘He is now in a completely different position, facing, with little experience of the system, a substantial prison sentence.

‘These are serious matters. He is educated. He has been a worker in bars and warehouses.

‘He has the benefit of substantial family support. His parents are in court today, and others have supplied references speaking of the other side to the defendant – a respectable family man, a hard worker and a person who people can rely on.

‘The defendant is in relatively poor health. He has depression, ulcers for which he has had surgery, Bell’s palsy and kidney stones.’

A jury found Knox guilty of three counts of rape and one of burglary.

He has been jailed for 12 years, two thirds of which he must serve before becoming eligible for release.

Judge Ian Harris said: “In my judgement, you never intended to pay her anything. You spiked her drink in the way she alleged and used violence on her to have intercourse with her.

She was incapable of fighting you off. She was trying to push you away, but you ripped her shorts off and were determined to have sexual intercourse.

“Testimonials say what a great person you are and how honest, trustworthy and helpful in your community you are. From my observations, I do not find you to be honest, helpful or trustworthy.”

Knox was also handed an additional two years on licence, an indefinite restraining order, and a requirement to sign the sex offenders’ register for life.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.