The co-founder of fashion label SuperDry has been found guilty of raping a woman in her home as she sobbed and pleaded with him to stop.
James Holder, 54, had been on a night out in Cheltenham, a major town in Gloucestershire in England’s west, when he and a friend got into in the same taxi as the woman, The Sun reports.
Despite telling the driver the men would be going to a different address, they both followed the woman her into her flat.
Holder has now been found guilty of raping the woman following a trial but cleared of a charge of assault by penetration.
Gloucester Crown Court heard Holder had fallen asleep on the victim’s bed so she went to sleep in the living room.
James Haskell, prosecuting, said: “She told the police she must have drifted off to sleep herself and the next thing she was aware was James Holder appearing in the doorway of her living room”.
“She told him it was late and he should go back to sleep, and told him to go back to the room he came from, and he replied, ‘Can’t you show me?’.
“She got up to show him back to the room he was sleeping in. James Holder told her that she should come into the bedroom too.
“She said no, she was tired, and she said he pulled her on the bed.”
Jurors were told the woman started to cry as the fashion boss groped and raped her and she told him to stop.
She managed to escape from him and left the bedroom, and it was not long before Holder left.
The woman later reported the May 7, 2022, attack to the police and gave a videorecorded interview to detectives.
‘Adored sex’
Mr Haskell said: “She described herself in the police interview as quite drunk that night”.
“You will hear some voice note messages she sent to her friends and you might think she was pretty drunk by the end of the night.
“The prosecution say that because of her intoxication she was more vulnerable.
“It is the prosecution case that James Holder exploited that vulnerability.”
Holder accepted engaging in sexual activity with the woman but says it was consensual.
In his evidence, Holder claimed he went into “extreme physical and mental shock” when he found out he was being accused of rape.
He added: “I went into complete meltdown, a nosebleed, and bawling like a baby”.
The tycoon also described himself as “old-school and chivalrous” towards women and said that he “adored sex”.
Holder, of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, denied charges of rape and assault by penetration.
The fashion boss co-founded SuperDry with Julian Dunkerton at a market stall in Cheltenham in 2003 but resigned in 2016.
This story was published in The Sun and is reproduced with permission.
