Man who accused Royal Navy officer serving life sentence for murder of sexual assault 'lucky to be alive'

Royal Navy double murderer Allan Grimson told police a sailor he is now accused of sexually assaulting was “lucky to be alive”.

He also told him that “if you’re going to rape somebody, to get away with it, kill it,” a court heard.

Former petty officer Grimson was jailed for life in 2001 for the murders of Nicholas Wright and Sion Jenkins in the late 1990s. The 66-year-old is now on trial at Winchester Crown Court accused of the rape of a teenager and indecent assault charges against three other male complainants, including a 14-year-old boy, dating between February 1994 and November 1999.

He is accused of the indecent assault of the first victim between February 28 and December 31, 1994 and of the second victim between September 30 and December 1, 1998. The defendant is accused of the rape and five indecent assault offences against the third complainant between February 1 and November 30, 1999. He also faces four counts of indecent assault and a charge of taking an indecent photograph of the fourth complainant, the 14-year-old child, between March 26 and October 31, 1999.

Grimson denies the charges.

John Price KC, prosecuting, told the jury Grimson had met the complainants, apart from the 14-year-old, when they had been young naval recruits taking part in a course at the Royal Navy Firefighting School on Horsea Island, Portsmouth, where the defendant was an instructor.

He said that when Grimson was interviewed about the case of Mr Wright in 1999, he provided details about some of these alleged offences and had said he had met the second complainant “in the same way” as the murder victim Mr Wright.

The complainant alleges that after a night out, he went back to Grimson’s flat in London Road, Portsmouth, with a friend, where the defendant indecently assaulted him by performing oral sex on him while the friend slept on a sofa in another room.

Mr Price said: “He said he was sobbing and whimpering at the time. He said Grimson had been a domineering character.

“Grimson spoke of other people he had thought of killing. He told the police that he would look first for an attraction to a young male, he would look at a class of recruits and he would think about who he would like to dominate, and then would ensure that they were in the group he was teaching at the firefighting school and try and befriend them.

“He described how he selected those whom he wanted to get power over, a sense of achievement.

“He said this to police: ‘If you’re going to rape somebody, to get away with it, kill it. And that’s the only way you can do that.’”

Mr Price continued that Grimson had described the second complainant as “lucky to be alive” because the friend was present in another room at the time.

He added: “He told police there were others who are lucky to be alive because of the circumstances. He says the circumstances were that on the occasion they came back to his house he would get into bed with them and start touching them.

“He thought that if it continues, he will kill them but there was someone downstairs.”

The prosecutor said the alleged incident involving the second complainant happened “just a matter of weeks before Allan Grimson murdered Sion Jenkins in that same flat when only the two of them were there”.

He said: “Considering what Allan Grimson has said, it was his word, (the complainant) may indeed by ‘lucky’ that on the night this happened his friend was nearby in one of the other rooms at that flat.”

The court has heard Grimson also told police “he would probably have killed” the 14-year-old complainant if there had not been another person in the flat at the time.

(Proceeding)