A YORK rapist has been jailed for ten years after he "destroyed the life" of a vulnerable child by five years of sex abuse.

Gary Evans, 43, used death threats and plied his disturbed victim with alcohol as he raped her repeatedly, a jury was told.

After she gave evidence against him, through his barrister he claimed that she could "manipulate the police" and was making false allegations against him.

The jury at York Crown Court convicted Evans of four charges of rape and one of indecent assault and he was jailed for ten years, with extra supervision on his release. He must also register as a sex offender for life.

Judge John Cockroft told Evans he had robbed the girl of her childhood and that he had preyed on a vulnerable child who already had problems before he started abusing her.

"No one can tell yet the damage you have done. (The girl) claimed that you have destroyed her life. She has undoubtedly been affected psychologically from all of this. You subjected her to the further humiliation of giving evidence."

Evans, of Tang Hall, York, denied all five charges. He served prison sentences in the 1980s for dishonesty and burglary.

Opening the prosecution, Julian Goose said Evans had had different jobs in and around York. He got to know the girl's family some years earlier.

He made the girl submit to the sex attacks by death threats and on one occasion hit her across her face, making a small cut.

On another occasion, he gave her alcohol and threatened to tie her up unless she did as he wanted.

Evans denied committing any sexual offence to detectives.

In his closing speech, his barrister, Robin Denny, said the girl had emphatically denied the abuse was taking place the year before she did reveal it.

The child was a "great manipulator of the police for her purposes", claimed the barrister, and made allegations about her behaviour regarding one of her neighbours, who was not Evans.

Updated: 10:39 Friday, March 01, 2002