Two “dangerous” thugs have been jailed for a total of 31 years for raping a woman who was snatched off the street after getting lost in a town.
Fabrice Mpata, 39, was driving in the Winson Green area of Birmingham when he encountered the victim, who asked him for help, probably because he was African, the court heard.
He took advantage of her vulnerability and the fact that she did not speak English and lured her into his car under the assumption that he was going to take her home.
Instead, he took her to a friend’s house where he raped her twice.
He then “offered” her to his friend Rigobert Ngambe, 45, who also raped her before she was abandoned in the street.
Fabrice Mpata, 39, kidnapped and raped an African woman who barely spoke English and got lost in the Winson Green area of Birmingham.
A passing taxi driver took the terrified woman to hospital and police were later able to track down the vile couple using DNA evidence.
Mpata, of Saltley, Birmingham, was previously found guilty of two counts of rape following a trial and was jailed for 16 years on Friday. He was granted an extended license period of three years.
Ngambe, from the Hockley area, was sentenced to 15 years in prison after being found guilty of a rape charge at Birmingham Crown Court. He was granted an extended license period of two years.
The court heard that the middle-aged African woman had been separated from other members of her family when she came upon Mbata on August 20, 2022.
Sentencing, Judge Avik Mukherjee said: “She spoke extremely limited English, if at all. She was stuck in Birmingham, lost and alone.
‘What happened to him? Over the next few hours, many hours, you both humiliated her, degraded her, and used her vulnerability against her.
“She needed help. She couldn’t find her way back to her sister-in-law’s house.
“She asked for help and she was desperate and she saw you, (Mpata), an African who maybe had some sympathy towards her and who she could trust to help her.
“What you did was the opposite of that. What you did, rather than help him, was help yourself. What you did was satisfy your sexual needs.
“What you did was rape her. What you did was exploit his vulnerability.
Mpata “gave” the kidnapped woman to his friend Rigobert Ngambe, 45, who also raped her before she was abandoned in the street.
“You promised to take her home, but what you did was take her to a friend’s house.
“She was crying and saying no repeatedly.
“Ngambe, I am satisfied, knew that you had raped her and knew that you were taking her to his house so that he could rape her.
“She was stripped naked and crying and you, Ngambe, raped her despite her pleas not to do so.
The two men “negotiated” the woman’s release in the early hours, when she was allowed to turn her phone back on and make contact with her family.
They then “disappeared into thin air”, while the victim got stranded again only to run into a taxi driver who took her to hospital.
Justice Mukherjee praised the civil servant for showing “the decency she was looking for the day before”.
He argued that after their arrest, the two men told a number of lies and claimed the victim had consented to sex.
But prosecutors argued there was a “significant degree of planning” due to numerous telephone conversations between the two defendants after Mpata kidnapped and attacked her.
Calling the two men “unpredictable”, he added: “It is difficult to imagine a more serious case than this.”
Donal Maguire, defending Mpata, said he had a “very troubled past” due to his mother’s murder.
He told the court that since his client arrived in the UK he had worked hard, gained qualifications and supported his local French-speaking African community and his church.
Mr McGuire said: “It was a day in a life that would otherwise have benefited his community. It is difficult to imagine more positive references. It’s not his character and past behavior.
Tom Kenning, defending Ngambe, a father of two, also described his client as hard-working and supportive of those around him.
He said since arriving in the UK in 2001 he had worked hard and secured various jobs, including as a delivery driver and at a local radio station.
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