This is Plymouth --A MAN accused of raping a drunken teenage girl in a park was due to give evidence today.
Craig Goldstone, 28, is on trial at Plymouth Crown Court for allegedly dragging the schoolgirl into bushes.
A jury heard that he later escaped from Charles Cross police station through an insecure door.
Goldstone, of no fixed address, denies rape in Devonport Park on the night of Thursday July 5 last year.
The jury yesterday heard two police interviews of Goldstone from the day after the alleged attack.
He repeatedly denied meeting the girl and said his DNA would not be found on her body.
Goldstone told officers: "I am telling you the truth. I have never met her in my entire life."
But in a series of facts agreed by the defence, Lee Bremridge, for the Crown Prosecution Service, said DNA matching Goldstone had been found on the girl's body.
He said a forensic scientist had concluded the chances of the sample coming from anyone other than Goldstone or a relative were less than a billion to one.
Cross-examining the girl, Ali Rafati, for Goldstone, had earlier claimed the pair had consensual sex in the park. He told the jury his client suffered from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.
The jury also heard more about the escape from custody on the Saturday morning, about 36 hours after he was arrested.
DC Yvette Rundle, the officer in the case, said she escorted Goldstone from a secure area of Charles Cross police station to an insecure part of the building.
She said he was due to take part in a video identification parade.
DC Rundle added: "My role was to escort him 18 to 20 metres to the identification suite and the identification officer takes over from me.
"He was in a waiting room and he left through an insecure door. He exited the police station down some steps into the city centre."
She said Goldstone was wearing a paper suit and flip-flops at the time.
Pc Chris Woodman had earlier told the court he had found the teenager "crying uncontrollably" after a passer-by had called the police on July 5.
He said she was curled up on the ground near the entrance to the park at Durrant Close when he arrived at about 10.30pm.
Pc Woodman said: "Quite clearly, she said she had been raped. She said he had dragged her into some bushes."
He added paramedics examined the girl and she was taken home to her parents.
Pc Woodman said he took a description of the suspect and went to the Salvation Army Hostel in Park Avenue, where Goldstone was identified by a receptionist as a resident.
The court heard Goldstone was found hiding under a bed in another man's room.
The trial continues. Reported by This is 1 week ago.