A MAN has been jailed for 11 years for raping a woman at knifepoint after tying her to a bed.

Carl Pemberton, 28, of Maes y Gornel, Rhos, was also ordered to register as a sex offender for life by a judge at Mold Crown Court yesterday.

The victim sent a coded cry for help by text message to her mother following the terrifying incident.

Her plan worked as her mother was so concerned that she rang the police, and the defendant was arrested.

Pemberton denied rape, assault by penetration, threatening her with a knife, and later assaulting her and threatening to kill her.

However, at an earlier hearing, he was convicted by a jury, which cleared him of a further two rape allegations.

Judge Philip Hughes said Pemberton behaved violently to the woman, dragging her into a house and up the stairs before tying her to a bed with her dressing gown cord.

He produced a kitchen knife, held it against her throat, and had sex with her against her will.

He forcibly stabbed the knife into the mattress of the bed.

“She was horrified by the experience,” the judge said.

He continued to frighten her with the knife and at that point she sent a coded message to her mother, telling her she loved her children, which worked because she alerted the police.

Pemberton later sexually assaulted the woman again when he bit her after dragging her by the hair.

He then harassed and intimidated her with threats in text messages – she received 300 texts in one 24-hour period.

In one he said he would slice her throat and in another said: “you are dead and I mean it.”

Defending barrister Jonathan Duffy said Pemberton had had a difficult upbringing, had cerebral palsy since birth and had to contend with the physical and emotional difficulties that produced.

The defendant was shy, clumsy and immature and while the pre-sentence report said that he had shown no remorse, that was because he maintained his innocence. Reports showed that he was not dangerous, said Mr Duffy.

Pemberton was cleared of a further rape on the woman where it was alleged that he hooked up a car starting kit to a metal framed bed to force her to have sex with him.

He plugged the device into an electrical socket, struck the crocodile clips that would normally go on a battery to make them spark, and then attached them to the metal bed frame, it was alleged.

She was in the bed, she feared that the frame was “live” and that she would be electrocuted if she moved and touched the frame of the bed.

“I had sex with him but I didn’t want to,” she said.

Pemberton said he suffered from cerebral palsy and epilepsy and could not grip with one hand.

He claimed he had never used the car jump start kit, had not used a knife to threaten her and had never stabbed the bed with a knife.

“I could not with one hand,” he said.