A dangerous sex attacker who raped multiple women in Aberdeen and the Highlands could spend the rest of his life behind bars after being classed as a high-risk offender.
Derek Mackay, from Invergordon, was convicted of a string of serious sexual offences, involving five different women.
He was found guilty of 11 rapes, three indecent assaults, one sexual assault by penetration, as well as two counts each of voyeurism and disclosing personal images.
In addition, he was convicted of three stalking charges, two physical assaults and a charge of pursuing a course of abusive behaviour against a former partner.
The offences were committed in the Highlands, Aberdeen and Glasgow between 2005 and 2020.
Mackay will learn if he is to be made subject to a Lifelong Restriction Order (LRO) once experts appointed by his defence team carry out a risk assessment to determine how much of a threat he poses to the public and women in particular.
Judge Lord Mulholland expressed his desire to lock Mackay up for life at a sentencing hearing at the High Court in Livingston.
The judge revealed that the prosecution’s reports had assessed the accused as being at high risk of re-offending, but he said he was obliged by law to give the defence an opportunity to consult its own specialists.
‘Derek Mackay is a violent, manipulative, controlling individual’
In his closing speech at the High Court in Inverness, advocate depute Graeme Jessop, reminded the jury of the evidence from Mackay’s victims, one of whom “kept telling him no” and who was left feeling “empty and used” and “worthless” following an attack.
Mr Jessop repeated the words of a witness who had told the court she was “petrified” when Mackay targeted her and said: “I was sobbing my heart out while he was hard at it. It made me feel so horrible, while he just got up and went away.”
He told the jurors: “Derek Mackay is a violent, manipulative, controlling individual.”
One of his victims travelled from Inverness to Livingston to hear the court pass sentence but was disappointed to learn that a further hearing had to be held.
Lord Mulholland told her: “There is a risk assessment now available which describes him as high risk, but his defence counsel is instructing his own report.”
The judge said he would defer consideration of requests by four of the five complainers to have non-harassment orders put in place banning Mackay from contacting them.
Mackay did not appear at the hearing after several failed attempts to set up a video link with Inverness prison where he is currently being held on remand.
His case was adjourned until December 3 at the High Court in Glasgow for a hearing to debate the information provided by prosecution and defence risk assessors.
Lord Mulholland stressed that sentence would not be passed on that day but he promised that Mackay’s victims would be given “plenty of notice” when the final date was set.
