[bbfan1991]

Two men have been found guilty of raping a 14-year-old boy in a city centre department store's toilets.



Alex Wilson-Fletcher, 42, of Oldham Street, Manchester, and Abdelkader El-Janabi, 55, of Artillery Court, Ardwick, attacked the boy in Debenhams on Manchester's Market Street in June.

The men approached the boy in the nearby Arndale Centre before leading him to the Debenhams store.

They were convicted at Manchester Crown Court and will be sentenced on 6 June.

In court, the boy said the pair had approached him in the toilets of the Arndale Centre on 2 June and El-Janabi had grabbed his arm and told him to follow him.

He said El-Janabi had then led him out of the shopping centre and across the road to the Debenhams store, where he walked him to the third floor toilets, followed by Wilson-Fletcher.

Once inside, El-Janabi and Wilson-Fletcher both touched him before El-Janabi raped him.

He managed to escape the pair and fled the toilets, doing up his trousers as he ran, and reported the incident to police later that night.

Substantial sentences

In defence, Wilson-Fletcher said he had been in both the Arndale and Debenhams toilets at the time of the incident, but had not seen or done anything, while El-Janabi denied being at the scene at all.

CCTV placed both men in the shopping centre and the department store and also captured the moment the boy ran from the toilets after the rape had taken place.

Images of the pair taken from CCTV were released to the media, which led Wilson-Fletcher to hand himself in to police.

El-Janabi was identified by the caretaker of the block of flats where he lived and by a man who had previously played football against him.

Both men were warned by the judge to expect substantial prison sentences.

Vile men. I hope their victim is OK now, but understandably it will affect him for the rest of his life.