69-year-old jailed for four years over rape

The former president of a village bowls club was jailed for more than four years today for raping a grandmother.

Leslie Black, 69, of Hampshire, attacked the 68-year-old married woman after threatening to expose an affair she was having with another man, Guildford Crown Court heard.

He told the victim two detectives were watching her every move and bugging her phone calls, but their existence had been fabricated by Black after he developed an "obsession" with the woman, prosecutor Caroline Carberry told the jury.

The pensioner, a widowed grandfather, threatened his victim with an ornamental knife during the attack in July 2008.

She later confided in her son and reported the rape to police later that year.

The court heard the pair had been friends but the woman had spurned Black's advances, which he made following the death of his disabled wife.

She was in a vulnerable state when the rape took place because of her fears over the private detectives she believed were following her, Ms Carberry told the jury.

Black, of Midhurst Road, Liphook, was found guilty of one charge of rape earlier this month and was today given a sentence of four years and four months by Judge Peter Moss.

He will remain on the sex offenders' register for 10 years.

A spokesman for Liphook Bowling Club, of which Black is a former president, did not wish to comment on today's sentencing.