On-the-run rapist gets life for attack on Staffordshire schoolgirl
A Portuguese paedophile who is at large after being convicted of raping a 12-year-old Staffordshire girl has been jailed for 11 years.
Antonio Alves skipped bail at Stafford Crown Court and has sparked a European manhunt. The 41-year-old contacted the girl over the internet pretending to be a 15-year-old boy and arranged to meet her.
He took her to a secluded spot near Cannock before raping her, a jury at Stafford Crown Court ruled. He failed to turn up for his trial last month when he was convicted in his absence. Yesterday, he was also jailed in his absence by Judge John Wait, who issued a European arrest warrant. Alves, of Aneurin Bevan Place, Rugeley, had previously denied two charges of rape.
The jury acquitted him of one but found him guilty of the other. The offence happened in Spring 2010, but did not come to light until two years later.
Mr Paul Spratt, prosecuting, told the judge today that Alves had disguised himself in an internet chat room. "She believed she was meeting a boy of 15. She, having got in to his motor vehicle she was taken to a less public place, where the act occurred. The matter came to light as a result of disclosure two years after the event, to her mother and in turn to a psychological counsellor.
"The defendant denied it, his interview asserted he thought she was over 16. He made no proper inquiry and had already lied to her in any event. I understand he is now in a European country."
Passing sentence, Judge John Wait said: "Alves is now 41, he had no previous convictions, but in March or April 2010 he raped a girl then 12 years old. At that time, he was 38.
"He met her on an internet messaging site by disguising himself as a teenage boy. Although she immediately realised he was much older than the boy she was expecting, in a state of uncertainty and surprise, she still got in to his car, where he raped her."
The judge added that Alves had been given an opportunity to surrender himself or to be arrested, but he continues to be at large. Alves, who was working in a cleaning job in the Cannock area, has also been put on the UK's sex offender's register for life.
