A FORMER Worcester teacher has denied rape at the first jury trial in the city since the coronavirus lockdown began five months ago.

Michael Leydon has pleaded not guilty to both rapes as the first trial since lockdown was announced in March got underway in Worcester.

The 61-year-old denies the rapes, said to have taken place in 2014, at his trial at Worcester Crown Court which started today.

James Dunstan, prosecuting, opened the case to the jury where it was said that the defendant had been a teacher at several schools including Nunnery Wood High School in the 1980s and had previously lived in Diglis.

Mr Dunstan told the jury: “It became rape because he continued after she had said to him stop. She told him she didn’t want him to do it. She tried to force her arms from his grip. He ignored her and carried on.”

Afterwards the woman, who cannot be identified, said she felt ‘used’ and ‘lay on the bed crying’.

Mr Dunstan said on a different occasion the former history teacher forced himself on her again and ‘again she asked him to stop’ and after that she ‘saw no point in saying anymore’.

The court head that police also obtained phone records which showed that Leydon sent the complainant a text saying: “I should have stopped on the night I took advantage of you against your will. Believe me, I wish I had.”

The jury was also played a video interview of the complainant’s account in which she said she felt ‘it was better to give in to him’.

The defendant, a father-of-three, has no previous convictions, cautions, reprimands or warnings recorded against him.

Mr Dunstan described how one of the defendant’s children, Christopher Leydon, had been convicted of sexual offences but that the defendant's view was that ‘police had made a terrible mistake and the prosecution was completely in error’.

The defendant, now of Westleigh Gardens, Worthing, attended a voluntary interview with police on September 12, 2017.

The trial continues.