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11th May 2023
05:16pm BST
A trans prisoner who started identifying as a woman after being released from prison for a sex attack on an underage girl has been jailed - for raping a friend just weeks later.
Lexi-Rose Crawford has been sentenced to nine years jail after carrying out her latest attack on an "extremely vulnerable" woman.
It is expected that under new government guidelines, the 24-year-old will serve her term in a male prison.
During Wednesday's sentencing, prosecutors outlined the attack and repeatedly referred to "her penis" being used to carry out the rape in the victim's home in April 2019.
Crawford, a biological male formerly known as Dominic Risden, began to identify as a female and changed her name after being released from a four-year jail term for child sex offences.
Then 18, the defendant admitted to arranging to meet a 15-year-old in 2017, taking her to a secluded woodland spot and forcing her into oral sex and intercourse.
Within weeks of being freed on licence in January 2019, and as she began using feminine pronouns, Bristol Crown Court heard Crawford raped a vulnerable friend after going to her flat to play computer games.
The defendant was found guilty of rape and sexual assault following a trial in March.
Crawford had claimed she suffered blackouts and couldn't remember the attack but this was dismissed as a "convenient excuse" by prosecutors.
Judge Michael Longman described Crawford's offences as "especially shocking".
He told her: "Given your previous record of offending, these convictions are particularly serious, given that the victim was your friend and a friend you knew to be vulnerable herself.
"You were a guest in her home at the time. That is also especially shocking and the sense of betrayal is perfectly understandable.
"Whether you remember raping them or not, it is clear you ignored their wishes and protests and carried on regardless, penetrating them with your finger first and then your penis against their will."
The prosecutor told the court that Crawford contacted the victim via Facebook and arranged to go to her house, saying "they were good friends".
"On this occasion when the defendant arrived at the victim's address, she brought a PlayStation. She sat on the sofa and went to kiss the victim who said 'no, stop' because she wasn't her girlfriend."
The prosecutor said the defendant then pulled the victim down to the floor and was "not listening to the victim's protests to stop."
He added: "She began to touch the victim sexually who pulled the defendant's hands away. She said 'stop, I don't want this' making it abundantly clear.
"The defendant got on top of the victim and put her penis inside the victim's vagina.
"She was told repeatedly to stop but wouldn't listen."
In a personal impact statement read to the court, the victim said the attack had such an impact on her, she had to move out of her home as she was too traumatised and had repeatedly attempted suicide.
She said: "Before that day I did have some mental health issues such as ptsd but I believe I was making progress. What Lexi did that day sent me back to square one
"It took place in my own home; I could not stay home anymore. I was having flashbacks and night terrors about what happened. I could not live there anymore and became homeless."
She said her trust of men was already low but got so bad after the attack she couldn't even be seen by a male doctor.
She added: "Lexi was supposed to be my friend and I feel betrayed by her."
She said she also increased self-harm and had regular suicide attempts that saw her sectioned under the mental health act.
"Since the incident my anxiety has been extremely high and I was worried I would bump into Lexi," she added.
"During the trial, I had to relive that day again and it was difficult."
The defence solicitor said mitigating factors included Crawford being only 20 at the time of the attack and that she was vulnerable herself having been diagnosed with gender dysphoria and emotional unstable disorder with no support.
She said that although the offences happened on licence since 2019, Crawford has not been in any trouble since.
She said: "It is difficult for her to express remorse. There has been some element of blocking things out and not wanting to think about what happened - but there is an element of remorse for what happened.
"She accepts the verdict of the jury but wants the jury to take into account her age, and what she's been through."
In passing sentence, Judge Longman said he balanced aggravating and mitigating factors including her still being on licence and said the sentence of the earlier offences were "powerful and serious" aggravating factors.
But in passing sentence he also recognised the defendant's own vulnerability as a mitigating factor.
He added: "You, yourself are in different respects vulnerable.
"I don't doubt your own deficits in certain areas contribute to a reduction in your culpability for this offending."
He sentenced her to nine years for the rape charge and six and half years for the sexual assault that would run concurrently.
Crawford will remain on licence once she is released after no later than two-thirds of her sentence and will be on the sex offender's register "indefinitely."
A restraining order was also made.
It is expected Cawford will be placed in a men's prison due to recent prison policy reforms in the UK regarding the treatment of certain transgender convicts.
The Ministry of Justice and Her Majesty's Prison and Probation Service announced new guidelines for housing male prisoners who claim to be women in February this year stating: "Transgender women offenders no longer housed in women’s prisons if they have male genitalia or have committed sex crimes."
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