A MAN who carried out a sexual assault and told his victim he would 'smash her daughter’s face in' has been jailed for four years.

Derek Wood, of Green Hill, Blackbird Leys, Oxford, was convicted after a trial at Oxford Crown Court last month.

A jury found the 55-year-old guilty of a sexual assault on June 2 last year and also of intimidating a witness on June 11 last year.

On Thursday 9th April, Judge Ian Pringle said Wood had crept into his victim’s bedroom when she was sleeping and subjected her to a sexual assault.

He said when she immediately reported the matter to the police he called her and said he would “smash her face in and her daughter’s face in” if she did not drop the charge against him.

Claire Fraser, defending, said her client maintained his innocence and did not accept that he had committed a crime.

She said: “He stands by the account he gave in the course of the trial.”

Miss Fraser said that although Wood has previous convictions for dishonesty and violence he “has been out of trouble for 16 years”.

She added that before his conviction he had not been working because he suffered from a form of vascular disease, as well as the anxiety disorder agoraphobia.

Judge Pringle said the complainant in the case had made it very clear that she did not want anything to do with Wood.

He said: “Your crime must have been distressing and shocking for her.”

Judge Pringle added that Wood would spend 10 years on the sex offenders’ register.