Door-to-door pervert jailed

A DOOR-TO-DOOR salesman who indecently assaulted a woman in her own home should never have been employed on behalf of TXU, his terrified victim said today.

Electricity salesman Kevin Moore, on learning of his year-long jail sentence, turned to the woman he sexually assault, and threatened: "You haven't heard the last of this."

Pervert Moore was hired by a marketing firm working for the electricity firm, which has its base in Ipswich.

Speaking after the trial, his victim who cannot be named for legal reasons, described the attack which has left her too traumatised to leave her Lowestoft home.

She said: "He used his job as an excuse to get into my house. The assault took an hour. It was terrible. He tried to take my clothes off. I screamed but there was no point because my neighbours were away.

"It was during the day. He took my number from some of the forms I had to fill out and then he called me after the attack."

Ipswich Crown Court on Monday heard how 46-year-old Moore, who denied indecent assault, preyed on his victim after discovering she was home alone.

The July attack took place three months after Moore, who recently married and has two teenage step-daughters, was bound over for harassing another female victim.

Moore, of Havercroft Close, Taverham in Norfolk, followed his victim in his car, waited for her outside a friend's house and drove past her home during a three-week period of harassment.

The court also heard that Moore also had a string of previous convictions for fraud.

But after trial his victim pledged to campaign for more stringent checks on salesmen .

She said: "I'm just appalled. Now I want to make people aware of just what might happen. These salesmen might have ID but they should be checked by police. If checks had been carried out this never would have happened."

In sentencing Moore to a year, half of which is to be suspended, Judge John Holt said: "You were a salesman who went from door to door and you took advantage of the trust involved in that work. It enabled you to enter the home of your victim and to discover she was a single young woman.

"You took advantage of that knowledge to return a few days later. You returned with the deliberate purpose to take advantage of her sexually."

Today TXU said Moore was not employed by them directly but had been hired by the market research company, Brann Ellert.

A company spokesman for Brann Ellert confirmed Moore had worked for the company and had been one of a staff of 50. He said: "He worked here for a short period but is no longer employer by the company."

He was unable to comment on whether Moore's references had been taken up but said new industry wide legislation compelled all representatives of the utility industry to sign a central data register.

A TXU spokesman said: "We are extremely concerned to hear about what happened. We can't comment on an individual who did not work for us. The person concerned was employed by one of a number of field marketing agencies and used to work on behalf of TXU as part of a contract that ended last July."