'Monster' rapist who interrogated his own victims faces jail for new sex attack

Milton Brown, 67, was jailed for 21 years in 1997 for raping one woman and sexually assaulting another after enticing them back to his flat after nights out, as well as a savage attack on his then-girlfriend. The trial attracted the attention of then-Prime Minister Tony Blair and triggered a change in law for sexual assault cases, as Brown sacked his legal team and spent five days cross-examining the three victims himself.

Defendants accused of sexual offences were subsequently banned from questioning their own victims, after a High Court judge ruled it amounted to ‘second rape’.

A detective in that case branded Brown ‘the most evil man I have ever come across’, while a sentencing judge claimed he was ‘lacking the feature that distinguishes man from beast  – namely humanity’.

He is now facing another substantial sentence after he was convicted of inviting a woman back to his flat to take drugs, before putting her in a headlock and raping her in May of last year.

Brown, of Stoke Newington, northeast London, was convicted unanimously of the jury of two counts of rape, one count of attempted rape and one count of assault by penetration. 

Jurors at Wood Green Crown Court were allowed to hear details of the 1997 convictions and an acquittal from 2019. 

On separate occasions in 1996, he threatened two women with knives and strangled one before twice raping one woman and twice indecently assaulting the other.

Alongside the 16-year sentence for those attacks, Brown was handed a consecutive five-year term for GBH after an assault on Susan McDonald, who was held captive by Brown and repeatedly beaten with a pool cue and a plank studded with nails.

Miss McDonald, who was on crutches for months after the attack, was found dead in her flat in 2004.

Brown also has convictions for robbery, aggravated burglary and ABH spanning back to 1978.

Judge Joanna Greenberg QC, presiding over the latest trial, said it would be “too prejudicial” for them to hear he was convicted of having unlawful sex with a 12-year-old girl in 1992.

Prosecutor William Eaglestone told jurors the victim in this most recent trial had gone to Sainsbury’s to pick up drugs and met Brown, who was also there to meet the dealer.

Mr Eaglestone said: “He seemed OK to her. She told police they bought drugs and he invited her to go to his flat nearby and smoke them.”

The court heard Brown’s mood “suddenly changed” when the victim’s boyfriend called her and she told Brown she needed to leave. 

The prosecutor said: “He put her in a headlock. She couldn’t breathe – she thought she was going to die.

“She screamed out hoping someone on the end of the phone would hear her screaming but the violence against her carried on. Having held her down and put her in a headlock so she couldn’t breathe, Mr Brown made her give him oral sex.”

She managed to escape the ordeal in the early hours of the morning after telling Brown they should go and buy more drugs, the court heard.

The victim said she spotted Thames Water engineers on the Seven Sisters Road, and ran over to them – while Brown fled on his bicycle.

In a police interview, she told officers: “I did everything to survive. I feel like it’s my fault. I went to someone’s house I don’t even know to smoke crack. I just feel empty.

“The disgusting thing is that I can still smell his smell.”

Giving evidence, Brown claimed the woman had taken heroin and crack cocaine and her mood was “up and down”. 

He said the sex was consensual and the victim was flirting with him, as well as performing gymnastic exercises and ‘twerking’ for him inside the flat.

Jurors also heard Brown’s police interview, where he said of the rape: “In my own home? Why would I do that in my own home? That’s something evil.”

The prosecutor said: “What Brown told you was a pack of lies. He is a veteran liar. Do not fall for the harmless old Rasta act. He is a monster, and this woman was his victim.”

A woman Brown was accused of raping at the same flat in 2019 also gave evidence in the trial. 

In legal submissions ahead of the trial, Judge Greenberg QC said the Crown Prosecution Service could present the woman’s evidence to the Wood Green jury because of the ‘striking similarities’ between the two cases. 

The alleged victim told jurors she had been taking drugs with Brown when she said she needed to leave and his “mood changed”. 

She said Brown put her in a headlock, which made her feel like she “couldn’t breathe and was going to die”.

Jurors at Snaresbrook Crown Court acquitted Brown of all charges.

Sentencing for the latest conviction was adjourned for an assessment on dangerousness to be made.