IT SHOULD have been a night of celebration. Dorchester was buzzing with hundreds of festive shoppers and families gathering for its Christmas Cracker extravaganza.

But December 5 2019 became a night of hell for one teenager after she walked back from the part time-job she had been working at during the event.

Adrian Cordery viciously attacked the 15-year-old as she walked through school playing fields, dragging her from the path on to the grass and holding her at knifepoint before slashing her clothes and raping her.

The horrific attack has had a devastating impact on her life and that of her family. But due to her bravery in going to the police and reliving the nightmare, her rapist is now behind bars.

After 33-year-old Cordery – a Dorchester chef with a long-term partner and two children – was found guilty of the horrific crime, police have revealed details of the huge operation that led to the rapist being caught.

The officer leading the investigation said he had never known of a similar attack in Dorchester in his 28-year career in the force.

Detective Inspector Wayne Seymour, of Dorset Police’s major crimes team (MCIT) said the work to identify the attacker began the same night of the attack after the terrified victim returned home and let out a ‘chilling scream’ to her family before she told them of her terrifying ordeal.

He said: “The scene was identified, an initial account was taken from the victim and she was taken for a medical examination at the sexual assault referral centre in Bournemouth. Her clothing was seized.

“I have been a police officer for 28 years now and I’m not aware of any or many previous incidents like this in Dorchester. It’s very, very unusual. What we class as stranger rape is very rare indeed.

“The key priority for me was the forensic evidence that was obtained from the medical examination. Other key lines of enquiry were the witness interview account of the victim. That was carried out on the Friday afternoon. A lot of detail was covered in there because obviously the information she can give us is key to trying to identify the offender.”

What followed was an extensive CCTV operation, with officers combing through more than 300 hours of footage from more than 60 properties to try to identify the attacker.

DI Seymour added: “It’s safe to say that there’s quite a lot of CCTV in Dorchester town centre itself, but on the outskirts and in the more residential roads the material is very limited.”

To hinder the investigation further, the incident happened late at night, it was dark and it was raining heavily that evening. All of these factors affected the quality of CCTV obtained.

A description was sent out to press. The hunt was on for an offender in his mid 20s to early 30s and wearing a light grey Puffa-style jacket with the hood up, light coloured trousers and leather gloves.

“The description we had was fairly limited,” said DI Seymour, “it was safe to say we didn’t know who the offender was.

“We had the route that the victim had taken and we knew that she had got to the end of the main shopping precinct in Dorchester, crossed the road, walked along Prince of Wales Road and she wasn’t being followed at that point. When she got into Culliford Road we then had somebody else on CCTV who we were convinced was our offender, but up until that point we only had the victim.

“I have to be honest, the public of Dorchester have been very helpful. I really would like to take the opportunity to thank them for the support they’ve given. A lot of people came forward to identify people who had been in that area.

“We then got a significant breakthrough in that we got the forensic results and we had a full male DNA profile that had been obtained from the swabs taken at the medical examination. We then had to find who that DNA related to.”

Due the severity of the crime, the National Crime Agency was drafted in to support the investigation, providing a wealth of experts, including a behavioural analyst and a geographical profiler.

A huge breakthrough came with the discovery of a snippet of CCTV footage of a man matching the description walking past where the victim worked. This was shared with every member of staff within Dorset Police and one officer – Will Conroy - came forward to say he knew who he was.

He had gone to school with the man and had grown up with him. He identified the man as Adrian Cordery.

The next day officers visited Cordery and he voluntarily provided a DNA sample. More than 20 DNA elimination samples were collected during the investigation but only one came back as a complete match to the DNA found on the victim – that of Cordery.

As soon as this result was confirmed, police went to arrest Cordery in Dorchester on February 10. He refused to stop for police and a car chase followed, ending in him crashing his car and fleeing across a field.

When arrested the next day and interviewed by police he denied that he was responsible for the rape but could give no explanation as to how his DNA came to be recovered from the victim.

DI Seymour added: “With regards to the victim, she’s been supported throughout, as have the family, and that support continues.

“I really would like to say, I have met the victim on a number of occasions and she is an incredibly brave young lady and I have nothing but praise and admiration for how she has presented herself and how she has come forward and assisted us with the investigation. It really was horrendous what she was subjected to.

“For anyone to be subjected to that sort of ordeal is horrendous but for a 15-year-old girl, that is going to be with her forever more, which is incredibly sad. I have nothing but praise for her and her family because her family have been very supportive as well.”

Cordery initially pleaded guilty to rape, but changed his plea to not guilty, leading to a trial at Bournemouth Crown Court. A jury unanimously found him guilty of one charge of rape and another of threatening with a knife. He will be sentenced on November 3.