Rape accused 'unsure how his DNA got on victim'

A man who denies the rape of a woman - for which innocent man Andy Malkinson spent 17 years in jail - has told his trial he accepts his DNA was found on the victim's clothing but does not know how it got there.

Giving evidence at Manchester Crown Court, Paul Quinn, 51, denied attacking the woman 23 years ago and said he had no idea how his DNA was found on her vest.

Quinn, of Exeter, Devon, and formerly of Little Hulton, Salford, denies two counts of rape and other charges relating to the attack on Cleggs Lane, Little Hulton, in 2003.

Speaking in court for the first time, Quinn told jurors that before his arrest he had searched for information about how long his DNA would be kept by police.

Earlier in the trial, prosecutors told the court Quinn had been charged with rape after modern forensic testing had matched a trace of DNA found on the victim's vest to a profile of Quinn.

The jury have heard that many traces of DNA recovered from the scene cannot be said to conclusively match Quinn - but one specific sample, recovered from the woman's vest, is a billion times more likely to have come from him than any other man.

Lisa Wilding KC, defending, asked Mr Quinn: "Do you accept that it is your DNA on [the complainant's] vest?

"Do you know how it got there?", Wilding asked.

"I do not know," he said.

Wilding KC continued: "Did it get there because you raped and attacked her on that night?"

During a police interview before he was charged in 2024, the father of six told the police he had had sex with scores of women around the period of the attack, which took place on 19 July 2003, the court heard.

Speaking in his defence, he told jurors he was ashamed of his lifestyle at the time, which included cheating on his now ex-wife, but he did not know the complainant in this case. The victim, during her evidence earlier in the trial, told jurors she did not know Quinn.

'Quinn made DNA searches'

In 2012, the jury were told, police took a sample of DNA from Quinn at his home in Little Hulton.

The prosecution alleges that some time after Andy Malkinson launched a public campaign against his 2004 conviction, Quinn began searching news stories about that case and also information about how DNA taken by police is stored.

Quinn told the jury he could not remember searching for information on Malkinson's case - but did recall looking up how long DNA was kept in the National DNA Database.

"Why were you searching?" asked his defence barrister, Wilding KC.

"It was just to satisfy questions in my own head. About my DNA being taken in 2012. If it could be stored, for how long."

"Why were you wondering that?" Wilding KC asked.

"Just inquisitiveness," he replied.

The court has heard Andy Malkinson, now 60, and originally from Grimsby in Lincolnshire, was convicted in 2004 on the basis of evidence police said placed him at the scene.

He became "the victim of a most terrible miscarriage of justice", jurors have heard, and he was freed in December 2020 when an appeal against his conviction was granted by the Court of Appeal.

His conviction was later quashed by the same court in 2023 when new DNA evidence linked the crime to another man.

There is no DNA sample from the incident that links Malkinson to either the victim or the scene, jurors have heard.

Quinn denies two counts of rape, two alternative counts of indecent assault, grievous bodily harm and attempting to choke or strangle someone to render them unconscious.