READ MORE: First look around Birmingham Pride 2021 which boasts 'biggest-ever' stage Hot on the heels of being named an official Gayborhood - alongside the LGBTQ+ quarters of San Francisco, Paris, New York and Ibiza - the community of Kings Heath is uniting on Sunday, September 26, for the first-ever Queens Heath Pride. In addition to Birmingham Pride making its return for 2021 in the city centre, Kings Heath will be doing some celebrating of its own.
#Gay pride dress trial#
“His initial denials at the first trial caused significant distress to his victim.”Īs well being jailed, McIlroy was placed on the sex offenders’ register indefinitely and made the subject of a Sexual Offences Prevention Order for 10 years that also bans him from contacting his victim.A brand new gay pride event is coming to part of Birmingham this weekend. “He took advantage of a woman who was vulnerable by virtue of her extreme state of drunkenness,” they said. The lawyer added his client’s guilty pleas “avoided the trauma of the victim having to go through a second trial”. He was aware of her sexuality and she was raped while she was sleeping.”Ī defence lawyer said McIlroy accepted his conduct on the night was “totally inexcusable” and it was only after the first trial that he realised that he had committed the crimes. The court was told that after guests became aware of what had happened and McIlroy was told to leave the house, he replied: “This will come back on me.’’Īfter the victim contacted the police, an investigation was launched.ĭuring interview, McIlroy, from Glengoland Gardens, denied the rape and claimed the sex was consensual.īut a prosecutor told the court: “This victim was vulnerable through alcohol and unable to give consent. She told him, ‘You know I am gay and I don’t want this’. I was trying to scream out, but I couldn’t’. “She said, ‘I was trying to push him off of me. It was then that she saw it was Karl McIlroy. “She managed to stop the rape, but the defendant pinned her down and put one hand on her chest and the other over her mouth, trying to keep her quiet and stopping her from talking. and she was being raped,’’ a prosecution lawyer told the court. “She later woke to find someone on top of her. In the early hours of the following morning, the victim became unwell and went to the bathroom before returning to her bedroom and lying down fully clothed. The group went back to a house with a carry-out of alcohol. She and her friends were at a pub in the city centre when McIlroy, who she knew, joined them. The woman was attacked on a Saturday in August 2018. I felt shame at having to tell my family and my new partner that this happened to me.” I felt guilty for a long time due to the way it made me feel. She said in her victim impact statement: “I have accepted that I have been a gay woman for over 20 years and I feel that this directly attributed to the abuse I have suffered at his hands. “It is the hope of this court that this sentencing exercise will mark a watershed in your progress from a victim to a survivor.’’Īntrim Crown Court was told the woman was given counselling after suffering a breakdown following the attack.īefore he struck, she was a “social butterfly”, but she is now “quite vulnerable, introverted, suffers from social anxiety and on edge all of the time’’. “By coming forward, you now find yourself totally vindicated about what happened to you. The defendant is the only one who should carry guilt or shame about what he did.
![gay pride dress gay pride dress](https://www.thehomoculture.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/IMG_6471.jpg)
The judge praised the victim for coming forward, telling her: “ probably the bravest thing you will ever do. At his retrial later the same month, he pleaded guilty to both offences. McIlroy went on trial in February, denying charges of rape and sexual assault, only for the case to be dropped because of a technicality. The 53-year-old will serve the next three years behind bars, followed by a further three years on supervised license.