1992 Rapist Named

8 February 2013, 06:00 | Updated: 8 February 2013, 10:52

A man who raped a woman in Bedfordshire twenty years ago on her way home from church has been named.

Daniel Borgers, 41, from Napier Crecsent in Scarborough, North Yorkshire, was sentenced to seven and a half years in prison on Friday 1 February 2013.

The judge at Luton Crown Court imposed reporting restrictions that prevented the media reporting the name of the rapist, but that restriction has now been lifted.

Borgers was only 21 when he raped a woman in her forties, but it wasn't until 2012, when he was arrested for a minor offence in Yorkshire, that his DNA was taken and police were able to link him to the rape in Stotfold in 1992.

Helen Guest, prosecuting, said the attack was committed as the woman was walking along a dark footpath in Stotfold, Bedfordshire. She was wearing her full salvation Army uniform at the time.

Her rapist warned her to keep quiet, threatening to 'slit her throat' if she did not, and covered her face with the hat from her uniform.

The victim reported what had happened immediately afterwards but a massive police inquiry at the time failed to identify the culprit.

Jailing Borgers on Friday 1 February, Judge Richard Foster said: "I can think of no greater violation on a fellow human being than what you did to that lady that Sunday evening.

"You have been apprehended 20 years later and brought to justice by DNA evidence."

Det Inspector Liz Mead from the Beds and Herts Major Crime Unit said: "This gives hope to victims that offenders can be brought to justice many years later thanks to the DNA database.

"It should also send a message to offenders that we will still come after them however old the offence is."

Tim Clark, defending, said: "He has a deep sense of shame and remorse. He knows he has to be punished and in fact he welcomes it.

"The victim says her faith has sustained her and that she pities him for the life he has had over the past 20 years in which he has had to think about what he did.

"He was a lost young man at the time and was abusing drugs and alcohol. He is a different person now."