A Spanish man accused of raping a Scottish holidaymaker has gone on trial in Tenerife.
Public prosecutors want the 40-year-old jailed for 14 years if he is found guilty.
The tourist had become separated from her boyfriend following a row after a boozy night out in the resort of Playa de Las Americas in the south of the holiday island when the alleged sex attack occurred in the early hours of January 30 2023.
Police were called after she stopped a local worker near the Veronicas Strip to ask for help crying and in a “state of shock.”
She was rushed to hospital after officers saw blood on her body.
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A man spotted running away as cops arrived to assist her was later ruled out as a suspect and the unnamed Spaniard, who has been in prison on remand since his arrest around a year ago, held after DNA tests linked him to the crime.
The holidaymaker admitted to having a hazy recollection of the night’s events because of the amount of alcohol she had drunk, but told detectives she remembered a man on top of her in a car with his hands around her neck as he forced himself on her.
She told a court yesterday in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, the island capital, she remembered coming close to losing consciousness during the violent incident and recalled getting out of the car after her alleged rapist drove her a short distance following the assault.
She denied claims by the suspect’s defence lawyer sex between them could have been consensual.
The local worker who the tourist first turned to for help gave evidence during the first day of the rape trial and said she had been in a state of shock and was crying.
One of the police officers who talked to the woman that morning described her in court as having a “lost gaze” and being almost unable to speak.
The trial is due to continue today at the Audiencia Provincial court in Santa Cruz.
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