Yahoo Finance Daughter of rape victim helps bring conviction 46 years on
A man who raped a 13-year-old girl has been convicted 46 years later, after the daughter conceived during his attack led efforts to bring him to justice.
Carvel Bennett, now 74, lured the teenager into a room in a house in the 1970s, where he forced himself on her, Birmingham Crown Court was told.
The victim found she was carrying a child soon afterwards and was forced to put it up for adoption after giving birth, according to The Guardian.
She had told her parents that Bennett was the father, but no action was ever taken to hold him to account.
Explaining why she did not give a statement to the police at the time, the victim said: "I had suffered and I wanted to get on with my life."
It was only when her daughter turned 18 that she tracked down her birth mother and then, by obtaining her social services record, she found Bennett named as her father.
In what is thought to be the first criminal case of its kind, the daughter, now in her 40s, confirmed Bennett was her biological father through DNA tests and helped bring about a police investigation.
Bennett was charged with rape, which he denied, telling his trial that the victim had told him she was 16 and consented to the sex.
But, describing her ordeal in court, the victim disputed this, telling jurors: "He told me to keep quiet. I kept quiet. I just let him do what he wanted to do. I let him use me.
"I was in shock. I was a scared child. I didn't fight Mr Bennett. I was a 13-year-old child."
Bennett is due to be sentenced on Tuesday.
