Police hunt for sex attackers

POLICE are investigating a number of sex attacks that took place over the Christmas holiday.

In Milton Keynes yesterday, detectives were hunting a man who indecently assaulted a 15-year-old girl just after midnight on Christmas Day. The man, described as in his late 20s, grabbed the girl, threw her over a small fence into a field near Bletchley and assaulted her before she made an escape.

A 31-year-old mother of two was subjected to a vicious sex attack as she walked home through a park after visiting friends in Glasgow on Christmas Day.

One of the attackers is thought to be 13. He and the other youth, said to be about 16, repeatedly punched and kicked the woman and hit her with a metal object. She was then indecently assaulted before being robbed and left bleeding on the footpath in Auchinlea Park, Garthamlock.

In Wales, a student who was raped on the way home from a Christmas party has revealed her identity to 3,000 other students in a bid to catch the man who attacked her. He is thought to be a fellow student.

Detectives believe that the man may have followed the woman for more than a mile after she left the party at a seafront pub in Aberystwyth on 11 December, before attacking her in the dimly-lit grounds of the Pantycelyn hall of residence.

The investigation was initially hampered because most students had returned home for the Christmas vacation.

But detectives have now sent a letter to all 3,000 students asking if anyone saw the victim on the night of the attack. It also asks them to fill in a questionnaire detailing their movements.

Meanwhile, in Stockton-on-Tees, a woman who falsely claimed that she had been raped in a car on Christmas Day may be charged with wasting police time.

The 21-year-old told officers that three men had dragged her into the car in the High Street and one raped her on the back seat.

But last night a Cleveland police spokesman said that they were satisfied her allegation was false and that 'rape did not occur'.

A file is being prepared for the Crown Prosecution Service to decide if the woman should face court action.