A serial sex attacker who preyed on adult women and underage girls during a campaign of abuse and rape was jailed for 15 years today.
Stuart Harding, 35, committed sex crimes against three women and two children at locations in Orkney.
He provided alcohol to young victims he targeted and had sex with a child victim on a mattress in the back of his white van.
Harding, of Birsay, Orkney, denied a series of charges during an earlier trial at the High Court in Edinburgh but was found guilty of 12 offences, including five or rape and two of attempted rape on unanimous verdicts by a jury.
A judge told him: “As you know, you have been convicted of a series of serious sexual crimes. Three of your victims were adult women and two of them were young females.”
Rapist calls it a ‘miscarriage of justice’
Lord Summers said that a background report prepared on him assessed him as a low risk of further general offending and a medium risk of sexual offending.
The judge said that one young victim who was sexually abused by Harding was given drink and added: “She was not of an age when she could consent.”
Defence solicitor advocate Iain McSporran KC told the court that Harding continues to deny the offences.
He said: “He has expressed very strong views that he did not receive a fair trial. He very firmly believes he has suffered a miscarriage of justice.”
Harding began his offending in 2012 when he assaulted and raped a woman at a property in Kirkwall, in Orkney.
His repeated attacks on her began when she was asleep but on occasions would continue after she awoke. He also attempted to rape the victim on other occasions.
The woman said she was very scared but Harding told her: “It sometimes happens when I am asleep.”
She said he told her that he had been to therapy and had “a sleep condition”.
Attacked underage victims
He went on to subject a second woman to rapes in Orkney in the summer of 2015, culminating in a forceful rape ordeal for the victim when she was seized by the head and restrained by her attacker.
During the violent attack she said she told Harding: “Stop, please stop.” But she said he became more forceful with her.
She said that what she suffered was “horrendous” and she had never experienced anything like it during a sex act he forced on her.
Harding attacked the third adult woman in 2016 and raped her when she was asleep and intoxicated at an address in Kirkwall.
The sex predator also turned his attention to underage girls and sexually assaulted and repeatedly tried to rape a 12-year-old schoolgirl at a car park near to a beach in Orkney on an occasion between December 2015 and December the following year.
Gave children alcohol in exchange for sex
The girl told the court that Harding knew her age because she told him how old she was after they met through social media.
He picked the child up in his car and asked her if she wanted to go in the back seat before telling her to take her leggings down.
He later went on to have sex with the girl when she was aged 14 or 15 on a mattress in the back of his van and would give her money or drink, such as bottles of Echo Falls wine.
Harding also provided another girl, who was aged 15, with alcohol and had sex with the underage victim.
Advocate depute Catriona MacLeod told jurors during Harding’s trial that it was the Crown’s position that there was “clear and compelling evidence” of his guilt.
Harding, who followed the sentencing through a TV link to prison, was told that he will be placed on the sex offenders’ register for an indefinite period.