Man `threatened rape victim with axe`

A pensioner repeatedly raped a teenage girl as she was growing up then threatened her with an axe years later when she went to the police, a court has heard.

Pensioner George Fairbrass, 71, from Pembroke Dock, west Wales, allegedly sought out the girl after she moved away in a bid to get her to drop all charges.

Huw Rees, prosecuting, told Swansea Crown Court that Fairbrass travelled several hundred miles to her new home in Hampshire, and threatened to kill both her and her mother.

The girl, who is now an adult, moved away from her west Wales home and only went to the police last summer, years after the alleged sexual attacks.

The jury heard that Fairbrass first sexually assaulted her when she was a schoolgirl aged 12, in 1994. She was then sexually and violently assaulted over a period of several years when Fairbrass had access to her. It is alleged the pensioner also raped her several times when she was aged 15 and 16.

Fairbrass denies making threats to kill both the girl and her mother at any time. He also denies carrying out a series of sexual assault and indecent assault offences and the allegations of rape.

Fairbrass claims the pair had a consensual sexual relationship from a period dating two weeks before her 17th birthday.

Under cross-examination via a video link the girl rejected any idea that they had been consenting sexual partners. She said that she was gay and the idea of having a relationship with a man of Fairbrass's age "disgusted" her.

She dismissed claims that her allegations were "a nonsense, a gross exaggeration and a fabrication."

The trial continues.

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