PAUL POUNDER BRADFORD SCHOOLGIRL RAPE CASE SHOCKS YORKSHIRE
In a disturbing case that has sent shockwaves through the community of Bradford, a man named Paul Pounder has been sentenced to eight years in prison for a heinous sexual assault on a teenage girl.The incident took place in Rastrick, a suburb near Bradford, just days after Pounder was released from incarceration, raising serious concerns about public safety and the effectiveness of rehabilitation efforts.
According to court proceedings, Pounder, aged 32 and residing at the Salvation Army Hostel on Leeds Road in Bradford, targeted a 15-year-old girl who was walking through Bramston Park.
The attack occurred in June, shortly after Pounder had been visiting relatives in the nearby area of Brighouse.
Witnesses in Brighouse reported seeing Pounder behaving in an overtly sexual manner towards teenage girls earlier that day, making derogatory and sexual comments about schoolgirls, which indicated a troubling pattern of predatory behavior.
As the girl passed through Bramston Park, Pounder suddenly grabbed her, pulling her into nearby bushes.
The girl immediately screamed and struggled to free herself.
Despite Pounder covering her mouth in an attempt to silence her, she continued to scream for help.
During the assault, Pounder indecently assaulted the terrified teenager, ripping off the buttons of her school shirt, and ultimately raped her.
The court heard that the girl was still wearing her school uniform at the time, which appeared to be a primary reason Pounder had targeted her.
Following the attack, Pounder returned to the hostel but was later found and arrested in Leeds a few days afterward.
During police interviews, he initially denied involvement, but identification procedures confirmed his presence at the scene.
Pounder, who has a long history of criminal convictions—70 in total, mostly for theft—had no previous convictions specifically related to sexual offenses, and only one incident of violence recorded in 1995.
His legal representative, Timothy Stead, emphasized that Pounder’s record did not include sexually motivated crimes and noted that his guilty plea in this case spared the victim from having to testify in court.
Judge Linda Sutcliffe, presiding over Bradford Crown Court, sentenced Pounder to eight years in prison.
She also ordered that he must register as a sex offender for the remainder of his life and imposed an indefinite sexual offences protection order.
This order prohibits Pounder from having any unsupervised contact with individuals under the age of 16, from having children at his residence, or seeking employment that could involve unsupervised contact with minors.
The judge described the attack as particularly heinous, emphasizing the profound impact on the young victim, who was still in her school uniform at the time of the assault, and highlighted the gravity of Pounder’s actions in her sentencing remarks.
