A Pakistani delivery driver has been jailed for eight years and three months after raping a vulnerable woman in a car park outside Worthing Hospital in England.
Suleman Mukaish, 27, from Worthing, West Sussex, attacked the woman on March 11 after she had left the hospital in an intoxicated and disoriented state. He was arrested two days later at Gatwick Airport, carrying a one-way ticket to Pakistan.
Hove Crown Court heard that the woman had been trying to hold onto a wall when Mukaish grabbed her and forced her onto the bonnet of a car. She was found shortly after by a member of the public who she told that she had been raped. Police traced Mukaish through hand and fingerprints found on the vehicle.
Sentencing him, Judge Christine Henson said that the woman had been “at her most vulnerable” when Mukaish, “a complete stranger,” attacked her. The judge noted the psychological impact on the victim had been “immense,” leaving her unable to return to the hospital due to flashbacks.
Mukaish, who was in the UK on a student visa and held a master’s degree in computer science, admitted rape at an earlier hearing. His defence claimed he had stopped to help the woman and that she had consented, though it was accepted in court she did not have the capacity to do so.
He will serve an additional three years on extended licence following his release.
