A ‘SEXUAL predator’ showered a teenager with gifts to try to keep him quiet about being raped, a jury has been told.

Terrence Eastwood, now 63, took his alleged victim for a caravan holiday and abused him, Preston Crown Court heard.

That was said to have taken place when the victim was 12 and the court was told how Eastwood bought the complainant clothes in an attempt to buy his silence.

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Prosecutor Hugh Barton told the court the abuse started not long after the victim found out his father had taken his own life.

Mr Barton told the jury Eastwood, of Stopes Brow in Blackburn, would lie on top of the boy.

Then in 2007, the court heard about the caravan trip where the victim said he awoke to find the defendant touching him. Mr Barton said in the same incident Eastwood went on to rape the complainant.

Mr Barton said: “The victim was so upset that the following morning he telephoned his mother. This young lad was in tears."

Mr Barton told the jury that witnesses noticed Eastwood spending an ‘inordinate amount of time with the victim’ and showering him with gifts. Mr Barton said Eastwood was a ‘sexual predator’ who step by step gained the confidence and control of his victim to ultimately use him for his own sexual gratification.

The jury heard the victim attended another caravan holiday with Eastwood and others. When the other party returned home early, the victim, who was then a teenager, was allegedly raped again.

The court heard when the victim was 17, Eastwood would take him for driving lessons around Whitebirk and repeatedly sexually assault him.

The jury was told Eastwood would give the victim cocaine and the painkiller Tramadol before raping him.

It is also alleged Eastwood, who is HIV positive, sexually assaulted the then teenager on a trip to the races.

The alleged offending only came to light when the victim confided in a counsellor.

During police interview he denied sexually abusing the victim, said he contracted HIV by kicking needles, said he had never been on a caravan trip with the complainant and said the only time he had spent alone with him was during driving lessons. But he denied ‘anything untoward’ happened during the time in the car.

Eastwood denies three counts of rape and eight allegations of indecent assault.

The trial continues.