A 45-year-old woman has faced the man alleged to have forced his way into her home and raped her 30 years ago.

The woman told the Supreme Court yesterday that she did not tell anyone about the attack until almost a year afterwards because she felt “ashamed”. The woman was a 15-year-old schoolgirl and her alleged attacker was 23 at the time.

The defendant, now 53 and from Pembroke, denies a charge of rape. Neither he or his alleged victim can be identified for legal reasons.

The woman told the court she was awoken by a knock on the door of her family home on a September night in 1988. She said she went downstairs, cracked the door open and saw the defendant outside.

She told him that her sister was asleep and the rest of her family were out. She said: “That’s when he forced himself in. He pushed open the door and gripped my arms. I was walking backwards and he was pushing.”

The woman added he pushed her on to the floor in the living room and raped her.

She told the court she remembered pain but was unable to cry out.

The woman said: “I couldn’t say anything. I couldn’t scream. Words wouldn’t come out of my mouth.

“It was like someone reached inside my throat and pulled the voice out.”

The woman added she blacked out and when she regained consciousness the man had left. She said she cleaned blood off the carpet with a kitchen cloth, took a shower and returned to bed.

The woman added: “My brother came home and went upstairs and heard my crying. He asked me what was wrong and I said nothing.”

She said she went to school the next day, but left after two classes. She added: “I was hurt. I was ashamed.”

The woman said she saw the defendant several weeks later as she walked home from school.

She added he asked her if she had told anyone about what had happened. The woman told the court she said she had told no one and asked him to leave her alone. She added she saw him at the same spot on repeated occasions over the next few months.

She said: “He used to be there watching like he was some sort of stalker. Just watching.”

The woman added that on one occasion the man gave her a “love letter”.

The defendant was alleged to have written in the note, which was read in court, that he loved her, was worried about her and wanted to “make love” to the teenager.

She said she broke her silence and told her mother about the attack ten months after it happened, when she had turned 16.

The woman added she also gave her mother the note, which her mother had rediscovered just over a week ago. The trial continues.

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