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| Version 1 | Version 2 |
|---|---|
| Gayle Newland: Sex attacker who posed as man found guilty | Gayle Newland: Sex attacker who posed as man found guilty |
| (about 3 hours later) | |
| A woman has been convicted of impersonating a man for more than two years in an "astonishing deception" to trick her female friend into sex. | A woman has been convicted of impersonating a man for more than two years in an "astonishing deception" to trick her female friend into sex. |
| Gayle Newland, 27, of Willaston, Cheshire, created a "disturbingly complex" online persona to achieve her own "bizarre sexual satisfaction". | Gayle Newland, 27, of Willaston, Cheshire, created a "disturbingly complex" online persona to achieve her own "bizarre sexual satisfaction". |
| A retrial jury at Manchester Crown Court found her guilty of committing sexual assault by using a prosthetic penis without her victim's consent. | A retrial jury at Manchester Crown Court found her guilty of committing sexual assault by using a prosthetic penis without her victim's consent. |
| She will be sentenced on 20 July. | She will be sentenced on 20 July. |
| 'Emotionally vulnerable' | |
| The Recorder of Manchester, Judge David Stockdale QC, granted Newland bail ahead of sentencing but told her the "overwhelming likelihood" was that she would receive "a significant immediate custodial sentence". | The Recorder of Manchester, Judge David Stockdale QC, granted Newland bail ahead of sentencing but told her the "overwhelming likelihood" was that she would receive "a significant immediate custodial sentence". |
| Newland was found guilty of three counts of sexual assault and cleared of a fourth count. She was told by the judge she would have to sign the sex offenders register. | |
| Newland said she created the Facebook profile of Kye Fortune - using an American man's photographs and videos - at the age of 15, because she found it difficult to talk to girls in person. | Newland said she created the Facebook profile of Kye Fortune - using an American man's photographs and videos - at the age of 15, because she found it difficult to talk to girls in person. |
| When giving evidence behind a curtain, the "emotionally vulnerable" complainant said Kye told her he was undergoing treatment for cancer and was paranoid about his physical appearance. | |
| She agreed to his demands for her to wear a blindfold, consisting of a sleeping mask and a light scarf, because she was in love, she said. | |
| The complainant, also in her mid 20s, said: "There was no point until the day I took the blindfold off that I thought for one second that a woman was the person behind this." | |
| She said she received a Facebook friend request from Kye, who shared the same birthday and interests as the defendant. | |
| She said Kye introduced her to Newland as his best friend. | |
| Mr Medland asked her: "To who were you consenting? | |
| She replied: "With Kye Fortune. The person I knew from the photos, the person I had spoken to, the person I shared all my dreams with, the person who I thought was half-Filipino half-Latino." | |
| Newland, who graduated from the University of Chester with a degree in marketing and creative writing, told the court the complainant approached her in a nightclub in 2011 and asked her if she was gay. | |
| She said: "I said I was not comfortable with it. She told me she was gay too. | |
| "She was not comfortable with it and no-one knew. There was common ground straightaway." | |
| Newland's version of events was that she then drunkenly told the woman about the Kye Fortune persona and the pair began communicating in character. | |
| The pair finally met up in character in 2013 but the defendant told the court she never dressed as a man and no blindfold was ever used. |