Sex attacker who terrorised woman in Kirkintilloch is jailed for eight years

A judge told Paul Hamilton (44) that he had left the victim terrified by the assault.

Hamilton, who was armed with a knife, forced the woman to take her clothes off, bound her wrists with cable ties and pushed her onto a bed before carrying out a sex act on her.

The woman told a court that he said he wanted to be the last man ever to touch her.

Hamilton was earlier convicted of assaulting the woman on August 6 in 2011 at a house in Kirkintilloch, in East Dunbartonshire.

He was also found guilty of guilty of attacking a second woman at a separate address in Kirkintilloch in 2013 after throttling her on one occasion and then sexually assaulting and raping the victim the following year when she was under the influence of medication.

Hamilton had denied the offences during an earlier trial and sentence was deferred on him until today for the preparation of a background report.

Lady Poole told him at the High Court in Edinburgh: “Your victims deserve credit for coming to court to give evidence against you.”

The judge said that one of the women now faced a daily struggle to trust people and has been left with emotional scars following the abuse he perpetrated.

Lady Poole pointed out that Hamilton has previous convictions for assault, one of which included striking a woman over the head with a baseball bat and seizing her by the neck.

She said: “I note you have not previously been sentenced to a term of imprisonment and that you have health problems.”

But the judge said there was “a degree of planning” involved in some of his offending and he appeared to lack remorse.

She ordered that Hamilton should be monitored and kept under supervision for a further three year period and placed him on the sex offenders’ register for an indefinite period.

The court heard that Hamilton continued to deny the offences.

Defence counsel Susan Duff said: “He realises that a lengthy period of custody is the only sentence that can be imposed.”

She said that Hamilton was assessed as posing both a medium and a high risk of re-offending.

Mrs Duff said: “He is a man in his 40s with long-standing alcohol problems.”

She argued that Hamilton could be dealt with by an extended sentence, involving imprisonment followed by post-release supervision, rather than the court making a risk assessment order which can lead to the imposition of an Order for Lifelong Restriction.

Hamilton followed the sentencing proceedings via a video link to Glasgow’s Barlinnie prison.