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Reynhard Sinaga

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Reynhard Sinaga
Sinaga's police mugshot
Born (1983-02-19) 19 February 1983 (age 41)
Jambi City, Jambi, Indonesia
Alma materUniversity of Indonesia
University of Manchester
University of Leeds
Conviction(s)Rape, sexual assault, attempted rape and assault by penetration of 48 men[1]
Criminal penaltyLife imprisonment (minimum term 40 years)
Details
Victims136–206+[2]
Span of crimes
2015–2017
Imprisoned atHM Prison Wakefield

Reynhard Tambos Maruli Tua Sinaga[note 1] (born 19 February 1983)[4] is an Indonesian serial rapist who was convicted of 159 sex offences, including 136 rapes of young men, committed in Manchester, England, between 2015 and 2017, where he was living as a student. Sinaga was found guilty of drugging and sexually assaulting 48 men during this period, 44 of whom he raped, some repeatedly, although police believe he was offending for years beforehand. Sinaga was prosecuted in four trials between 2018 and 2020 and was given concurrent life sentences with a minimum term of 30 years; raised to 40 years in December 2020 by the Court of Appeal.[5][6][7] The Crown Prosecution Service described Sinaga as being the most prolific rapist in British legal history.[6]

Sinaga is believed by police to have raped or assaulted at least 206 men since 2015,[2] which includes the two years before his arrival in the UK.[8] In Manchester, he waited for potential victims outside nightclubs, pubs and similar venues in the early hours.[8][9][10] He then offered his victims a stay at his flat, subsequently drugging and raping them.[11] After some of the assaults, Sinaga boasted about his actions on WhatsApp.[12]

Background

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Reynhard Sinaga was born on 19 February 1983 in the Indonesian city of Jambi and grew up in Depok, West Java.[13][14] Growing up in an affluent conservative Catholic family, Sinaga is ethnically from the Batak people.[15] After completing a degree in Architecture at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Indonesia in Depok in 2006,[16] he moved to the UK on a student visa and began to study in August 2007 at the University of Manchester, where he completed an MSc in urban planning in 2009 and an MA in sociology in 2011.[5]

Remaining in Manchester, Sinaga began to study for a PhD at the University of Leeds in 2012, which he did not complete. His thesis, entitled Sexuality and everyday transnationalism among South Asian gay and bisexual men in Manchester, was submitted in August 2016 and was assessed as a "fail", but he was permitted to amend and resubmit it.[13] Sinaga was rewriting his thesis at the time of his arrest.[17] He was financially supported by his father, a banker who moved into the palm oil sector.[16] His mother came to the first pre-trial hearing but was not present for any of the four trials. While in Manchester, Sinaga lived openly as a gay man, living not far from Manchester's gay village, and reportedly had many boyfriends.[10]

Attacks

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Sinaga lived in a flat in central Manchester which acted as a base for his assaults. He would wait for men leaving nightclubs and bars before leading them to his flat, often offering them somewhere to have a drink or call a taxi. Giving them a drugged drink, believed to have been spiked with GHB, Sinaga would then assault the victims while they were unconscious and video the attack with a mobile phone.[6] He rarely used condoms when penetrating his victims; despite this, he was found negative for sexually transmitted infections upon his arrest.[12]

At the time his sentence was announced in January 2020, almost all of Sinaga's victims were known to have been heterosexual young men, with three exceptions.[10] He saw "turning" heterosexual men as a sport. Of one victim in January 2015, who had argued with his girlfriend in the Factory nightclub near Sinaga's home, he told a WhatsApp group: "SuperRey saves straight boys from their monstrous girlfriend."[13]

In June 2017, his last victim, an 18-year-old amateur rugby union player, regained consciousness during the rape, fought off his attacker, and reported the incident to the police.[10] Sinaga was badly beaten and hospitalised, while police initially arrested his victim on suspicion of grievous bodily harm.[8] Subsequent examination of Sinaga's iPhone by the police led to the discovery of more than 3 terabytes of digital video evidence of his assaults and rapes.[8][18] Many of his victims were traceable because Sinaga kept their phones, watches, ID cards, etc.,[6] and he had used social media to contact his unknowing victims online.[10] Some victims unwittingly accepted his friend requests on Facebook.[8] Although the earliest case to be tried in courts stems from 2015, police believe Sinaga began the attacks in 2005, two years before he arrived in the UK.[8]

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Sinaga's earliest established offence occurred on New Year's Day, 2015. The man was heterosexual, like the majority of Sinaga's victims, and could remember nothing when he awoke the next day in his abuser's flat covered in vomit.[12] Because of the false concern from Sinaga, he (like many others) apologised for imposing on his host before leaving; he had been raped twice.[5]

Sinaga pleaded 'not guilty' to all charges made against him, resulting in his victims having to endure relating evidence in court, as well as the videos being shown to the jurors and others present at the trials.[5] In his defence, he claimed to have been playing sex games, with the other man playing dead to fulfill his fantasies.[19] He claimed that the encounters were consensual, a claim found to be false as victims were heard snoring in the videos.[11]

Sinaga attended St Chrysostom's Church, a liberal congregation of the Church of England, and the church provided Sinaga with a character reference for his trial.[20][21] The presiding judge, Suzanne Goddard, remarked during the sentencing of the second trial that "It is almost beyond belief that someone who could profess some Christian faith could at the same time have been committing such wicked and evil crimes."[13] The St Chrysostom's Church later distanced itself from Sinaga after his conviction.[21]

The four trials took place between 1 June and 10 July 2018 covering 13 victims, 1 April to 7 May 2019 with 12 victims, 16 September to 4 October 2019 covering 10 victims, and December 2019 with 13 victims,[4] a total of 48 named victims out of at least 206 Sinaga is believed to have raped while they were unconscious.[11] Police have been unable to trace 70 of his victims.[6]

Sinaga was convicted of 136 counts of rape, 14 counts of sexual assault, eight counts of attempted rape, and one count of assault by penetration.[6][11] His defence barrister said that he could offer no mitigation.[22] In the first two trials, he was given 88 concurrent life sentences with a minimum 30-year term before being considered for parole.[8] This was raised to 40 years by the Court of Appeal on 11 December 2020.[7] Reporting restrictions were in place until the conclusion of his last trial, after which his crimes were made public for the first time.[6] Detectives subsequently set up a hotline with the expectation that dozens of new victims could come forward.[23] Sinaga was originally held at HMP Strangeways and reported as refusing to cooperate with investigators.[8] He was moved to HM Prison Wakefield in April 2020, several months after his final trial.[24]

On 16 January 2020, Sinaga's case was referred to the Court of Appeal for being too lenient. Geoffrey Cox was reported as saying a "whole life order" should be considered for Sinaga, meaning he would never be eligible for parole.[25][26] While a whole life order has never been imposed for crimes other than murder, Judge Suzanne Goddard QC considered this option when sentencing Sinaga and said that he should never be released. In her summing up, Judge Goddard commented: "In my judgment, you are a highly dangerous, cunning, and deceitful individual who will never be safe to be released, but that is a matter for the Parole Board."[8][22] Sinaga’s earliest date of eligibility for a parole board hearing is 2060, when he will be 77 years of age.[27]

Aftermath

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Sinaga's father, Saibun Sinaga, in an interview with BBC Indonesia, expressed his opinion a day after the sentencing, where he was quoted as saying that his son "got what he deserved" and that "we accept the verdict. His punishment fits his crimes. I don't want to discuss the case any further."[15]

Sinaga's mother, Normawati Silaen, told The Sunday Times in 2020 that when she visited him in hospital in 2017 she had "wondered if [Sinaga's final victim] had made up the story". She stated that she was not aware that he was gay: "We are a good Christian family who do not believe in homosexuality. He is my baby."[28][29]

The charity Safeline reported a record increase in calls to its hotline for male sexual abuse survivors in the aftermath of the case. Duncan Craig, founder of Survivors Manchester, the charity supporting several of Sinaga’s victims, stated that it had started a national conversation regarding men opening up about sexual abuse.[23]

After Sinaga's conviction, the mayor of his hometown of Depok, Mohammad Idris, announced that he planned to order raids on the local LGBT community.[30][31] The announcement was swiftly condemned by human rights activists saying that conservatives in Indonesia were using Sinaga as an excuse to target the gay community in the country.[32]

While incarcerated at HM Prison Wakefield for his life sentence, Sinaga was allegedly attacked by another inmate, Jack McRae on 4 July 2023.[33]

See also

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Notes

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  1. ^ Under Indonesian law, a full name is a single personal name with no legal distinction for any family names or inherited names (see Indonesian name).[3] Indonesian and Indonesian language sources formally refer to the individual by the first element of his name, "Reynhard" whilst English language British sources formally refer to the individual by the final element of his name, "Sinaga".

References

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  1. ^ Halliday, Josh (9 January 2020). "Police issue warning over posts 'identifying Reynhard Sinaga victims'". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 January 2020.
  2. ^ a b "Reynhard Sinaga: Serial rapist 'abused 206 men'". BBC News. 11 December 2020. Retrieved 17 December 2020.
  3. ^ "Indonesian Culture > Naming > Naming Conventions". Special Broadcasting Service. Retrieved 4 June 2024. While surnames or 'inherited names' are not legally recognised[...]
  4. ^ a b "Britain's most prolific rapist jailed for life following historic CPS prosecution". Crown Prosecution Service. 6 January 2020. Archived from the original on 26 January 2020. Retrieved 6 January 2020.
  5. ^ a b c d Ward, Victoria (6 January 2020). "Reynhard Sinaga: How the 'evil sexual predator' spent years targeting vulnerable young men". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 7 January 2020.
  6. ^ a b c d e f g "Reynhard Sinaga: 'Evil sexual predator' jailed for life for 136 rapes". BBC News. 6 January 2020. Retrieved 7 January 2020.
  7. ^ a b "Joseph McCann and Reynard Sinaga: Notorious rapists whose crimes 'shocked the nation' have jail terms increased to 40 years". Sky News. 11 December 2020. Retrieved 11 December 2020.
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i Pidd, Helen; Halliday, Josh (6 January 2020). "Reynhard Sinaga jailed for life for raping dozens of men in Manchester". The Guardian. Retrieved 8 July 2020.
  9. ^ Vittozzi, Katerina (6 January 2020). "Reynhard Sinaga: UK's worst serial rapist handed multiple life sentences for campaign against men". Sky News. Retrieved 6 January 2020.
  10. ^ a b c d e Evans, Martin; Ward, Victoria; Gardner, Bill (6 January 2020). "Reynhard Sinaga, a Manchester based student, named as Britain's worst ever rapist". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 7 January 2020.
  11. ^ a b c d Duncan, Conrad; Dearden, Lizzie (6 January 2020). "Reynhard Sinaga: Most prolific rapist in UK history jailed for life over Manchester attacks". The Independent. Retrieved 6 January 2020.
  12. ^ a b c Pidd, Helen (6 January 2020). "How serial rapist posed as a good Samaritan to lure victims". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 January 2020.
  13. ^ a b c d Pidd, Helen; Halliday, Josh (6 January 2020). "Reynhard Sinaga: the 'Peter Pan' student who raped scores of men". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 January 2020.
  14. ^ Indonesia's Ancient Sinaga Clan Distances Itself From 'Britain's Worst Rapist'
  15. ^ a b Nurdin, Endang; Henschke, Rebecca (7 January 2020). "Reynhard Sinaga: Father of rapist says 'punishment fits his crimes'". BBC News. Retrieved 7 January 2020.
  16. ^ a b De Simone, Daniel (7 January 2020). "Manchester rapes: How Reynhard Sinaga found his victims". BBC News. Retrieved 7 January 2020.
  17. ^ Speare-Cole, Rebecca (7 January 2020). "Who is Reynhard Sinaga? UK's worst rapist who attacked as many as 195 men". Evening Standard.
  18. ^ Picheta, Rob (6 January 2020). "Britain's most prolific rapist spent 12 years drugging and assaulting young men -- until one woke up". CNN. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  19. ^ Simpson, John (7 January 2020). "PhD student Reynhard Sinaga raped up to 200 men". The Times. Retrieved 7 January 2020. (subscription required)
  20. ^ Beckett, Adam (10 January 2020). "Congregation shocked to hear of prolific rapist in their midst". Church Times. Retrieved 21 January 2020.
  21. ^ a b "Church distances itself from man described as Britain's most prolific rapist". Church News Ireland. 9 January 2020. Retrieved 13 January 2020.
  22. ^ a b Abbit, Beth (6 January 2020). "Everything judge told 'evil monster' Reynhard Sinaga as he's jailed for life". Manchester Evening News. Retrieved 7 October 2021.
  23. ^ a b Halliday, Josh (10 January 2020). "Detectives investigate new allegations against rapist Reynhard Sinaga". The Guardian. Retrieved 14 January 2020.
  24. ^ Abbit, Beth (30 April 2020). "Serial rapist Reynhard Sinaga moved from Manchester to notorious 'Monster Mansion'". Manchester Evening News. Retrieved 8 February 2021.
  25. ^ Culbertson, Alix (16 January 2020). "Reynhard Sinaga: Prolific rapist should 'never be released', says Attorney General as he reviews sentence". Sky News. Retrieved 8 July 2020.
  26. ^ Britton, Paul (16 January 2020). "Reynhard Sinaga's prison sentence could soon become 'whole life order'". Manchester Evening News. Retrieved 8 July 2020.
  27. ^ Bardsley, Andrew (22 August 2021). "When Manchester's most notorious criminals are due for release from prison". The Manchester Evening News. Retrieved 2 September 2021.
  28. ^ "Reynhard Sinaga: Mother of Britain's most prolific rapist says he is still 'my baby'". The Sunday Telegraph. PA Media. 12 January 2020. Retrieved 12 January 2020.
  29. ^ Collins, David (12 January 2020). "Reynhard Sinaga's mother: the 'world's worst rapist' is still my baby". The Sunday Times. Retrieved 12 January 2020. (subscription required)
  30. ^ Widianto, Stanley (14 January 2020). "Indonesia rights body condemns LGBT raids ordered by mayor after UK rape case". Reuters. Retrieved 14 January 2020.
  31. ^ Ardila Syakriah (11 January 2020). "Depok mayor calls for more anti-LGBT raids in wake of Reynhard Sinaga case". The Jakarta Post.
  32. ^ Varagur, Krithika (14 January 2020). "Indonesia: LGBT community faces backlash after Reynhard Sinaga's rape conviction". The Guardian. Retrieved 16 January 2020.
  33. ^ "Man charged with attempted ABH against rapist Reynhard Sinaga". www.bbc.com. Retrieved 19 December 2024.
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