Man raped girl and pushed her brother off cliff

A man has been found guilty of raping a young girl and throwing her brother off a cliff after the boy discovered she was being abused.

Anthony Stocks tried to kill the boy near Ovingdean, close to Brighton, in September 2022.

The 54-year-old, from Goring, Oxfordshire, was found guilty of four counts of sexually assaulting a child under 13, causing a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity and rape of a child under 13.

He was also found guilty of attempted murder.

The boy survived the 100ft (30.5m) fall but received severe injuries.

Police called his recovery "miraculous".

The jury heard how Stocks had told the girl about his plan, and she warned her brother.

Via pre-recorded interviews, the girl said Stocks would force her to carry out sexual acts.

It made her "frightened" and "uncomfortable" and she ended up telling her brother about "all of it… in one big go", she said.

Afterwards her brother would then try to come between Stocks and her when he could, Oxford Crown Court heard.

The boy described how he would "interfere and stop everything - [Stocks] was really upset I think".

The girl said on another day Stocks, referring to her brother, told her: "I want to get rid of him so we can be alone so [he] doesn't interfere with us."

She added: "All I remember is he was going to push him of a cliff."

The girl said she was "worried" and that night warned her brother.

The boy said on the day of the attempt on his life he had been on a trip with Stocks, who is known to the family, to see his favourite football club in London, when he was then asked if he wanted to "go see a view".

He did not remember being pushed, and the last thing he recalled was standing on the edge of the cliff, before waking up in hospital, the court heard.

A passer-by told jurors that after the near-fatal fall Stocks sat down and rolled a cigarette.

Stocks claimed the visit to the cliff top had been a last-minute change of plan.

He said they took a taxi there because it had featured in the film Quadrophenia.

He said the boy had “started getting a bit moody”, and that he warned him not to cross a safety fence close to the cliff’s edge.

On a previous occasion, Stocks took the boy to a quarry to push him into it but changed his mind, the trial heard.

The jury was told Stocks was a one-time film extra who had appeared in the Star Wars franchise, along with JK Rowling’s Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.

When he was arrested, police found thousands of pornographic pictures and videos on his phone, all of them “legal”, according to his counsel.

But the jury raised a number of questions about his internet searches after the defence team had earlier accepted he had viewed films about adults having sex with younger people.

Stocks will be sentenced in “due course”, the judge said.

Det Sgt Rachel Jackson, of Thames Valley Police’s child abuse investigation unit, said Stocks had committed "absolutely horrific and evil offences".

"Over a period of around three years, Stocks had subjected the girl to sexual abuse and rape, and when the boy became aware of what was happening, Stocks hatched his evil plan to kill him," she said

"What then transpired is nothing short of horrifying.

"Stocks took the boy to one of the highest set of cliffs in the area and hurled him from the top, knowing that this would have almost certainly killed him."

She said he had "intended to kill the boy to get him out of the way so he could continue his offending against the girl - this failed".

"He is a very dangerous individual, who had no thought about anybody but himself, to protect himself from prosecution by removing the boy from the equation," she continued.

"He has not shown any remorse throughout the course of this investigation.

"I would like to praise both victims for their unbelievable courage and resolve that helped us to bring Stocks to justice."

She described the investigation as "without a doubt one of the worst cases of child abuse that I have investigated".

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