Convicted Rossendale rapist acquitted of child sex abuse charge (From Lancashire Telegraph)

Convicted Rossendale rapist acquitted of child sex abuse charge

10:50am Friday 18th February 2011 in News By Wendy Barlow, Court reporter

A CONVICTED rapist currently serving nine years behind bars has been cleared of sexually abusing a little girl.

Wesley Dean, 50, was found not guilty of six counts of indecency with a child, one allegation of sexual activity with a child and three charges of indecent assault, after a four day trial at Burnley Crown Court.

Ex-football club manager Dean, who lived at Booth Road, Stacksteads, until his arrest for the rapes in 2007, had denied all the child sex charges against him.

He had fought back tears as he told the jury of his ‘devastation’ at being accused.

He will now continue serving his sentence at a jail in York, after being convicted of six counts of rape against two adults in late 2008 and early 2009.

The prosecution had alleged the defendant, a father of two, who lived alone in a succession of flats in Rossendale, after his marriage collapsed, had molested the child behind an ice cream van.

She was said to have been left sobbing and scared by his alleged behaviour, did not tell anybody, but eventually confided in her mother.

The defendant told the jury the alleged abuse never happened.

He said the things he had been accused of were ‘disgusting’ and he had been ‘absolutely devastated’ by the allegations against him.

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