A SCOTS bodybuilder was jailed for six years today after throttling a teenage girl during a rape attack on the victim.
Nicholas Grannell, 27, met his young victim after he was assigned as her personal trainer when she joined the gym he worked at.
A judge told Grannell that there was no alternative to a custodial sentence given the seriousness of the offence and the harm caused.
Lord Renucci pointed out that Grannell became violent with the 16-year-old girl and put his hands around her throat during the assault in Dundee on September 1, 2023.
The judge said: “She was crying and telling you to stop, that she did not want it, but you ignored her and carried on.”
He said at the High Court in Edinburgh that Grannell was aged 25 at the time of the offence and was significantly older than the victim.
The judge said it was clear that the impact of the offending was significant and enduring.
Grannell, formerly of South Victoria Dock Road, in Dundee, had denied assaulting and raping the teenager during an earlier trial, but was convicted of the crime.
During the sex attack he scratched the girl with his finger nails, pushed her head down, seized her by the neck and compressed her neck, restricting her breathing.
Defence counsel Gary Allan KC said Grannell had no previous convictions that were of any relevance.
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He said Grannell had studied psychology at university and added: “His ambitions to pursue that career, after he is free to do so, are in tatters following this conviction.”
Mr Allan said that numerous character references had been provided to the court on behalf of Grannell.
Lord Renucci told Grannell that he would be placed on the sex offenders’ register indefinitely and made a non harassment order banning him from approaching, contacting or communicating with the victim.
In a statement via law firm Digby Brown, the brave young survivor said: “Nicholas Grannell will only spend six years in jail but he has put me in a life-long emotional prison I can never escape from.
“I struggle to understand why this happened to me and how the confident girl I was is now isolated from the life I enjoyed.
“Grannell is a violent, manipulative and dangerous predator who abused his position to target me when I was just 16-years-old.
“I don’t know if I’ll ever be the same again, but I am dealing with what he did to me the best I can.”
