Phil Collins, formerly of Dickens Road, Ipswich, was this week sentenced to 13-and-a-half years in jail after admitting raping a woman in the Christchurch Park area in 1987. The 52-year-old father-of-three was previously imprisoned for ten years after being convicted of raping a 17-year-old in Gippeswyk Park in 1990.

Clive Sims, a retired forensic psychologist formerly based at St Clement’s Hospital, Ipswich, said Collins could have been made to feel inferior by a woman in his early years, experiences that later shaped his behaviour as a predatory rapist.

Dr Sims said this had bred a desire in Collins to assert his power over women – an explanation for why he raped one woman in her home, where she felt safest. “His whole aim was to degrade the victim and degrade women generally,” he added. “His early history could have played a part.

“He may have had experiences from women that have made him feel inferior and in order to prove he is a man he has to carry out an attack and not just a beating up or something like that. It has to be sexual because that’s a way of showing yourself, I’m a man.”