A SEX attacker who repeatedly molested an Accrington woman, starting when she was asleep, has been locked up for 40 months.

Burnley Crown Court heard groundworker Jonathan Walmsley, 23, had put his body weight on his victim by lying on her, so she could not escape.

She froze in fear as Walmsley groped her and subjected her to two sex acts at a house in Accrington after a night out.

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The hearing was told the defendant, who had been drinking, told the sobbing woman: “It’s your fault, because you're so gorgeous.”

The victim told her friend after her ordeal: “He has spent the last two hours trying to rape me.”

Walmsley has been sentenced for sex offences twice before and was on the sex offenders’ register when he struck last November 15, three months after release from jail.

The defendant, of Blackburn Road, Accrington, admitted two charges of assault by penetration and one of sexual assault. He was ordered to sign the sex offenders register indefinitely.

Tim Storrie, for Walmsley, said: “He thought he was justified in trying to take advantage of an opportunity that came his way.”

Sentencing, Judge Beverley Lunt said:” These offences were committed only three months after you had been released from your last, significantly brief sentence of imprisonment.”

The judge, who said the assaults were a significant increase in the seriousness of Walmsley's offending, told him: “You knew perfectly well you were taking advantage of her in the worst possible way.

“You caused this woman great fear, you caused her shock, humiliation and some degree of physical discomfort.”