Man has his conviction quashed after spending two years in jail

A man who spent more than two years in jail for a rape he did not commit had his conviction quashed after a relative took only a minute to uncover a series of bombshell Facebook messages missed by police  that proved his innocence.

In the latest rape case to highlight failings in the criminal justice system, The Mail on Sunday can reveal that the jury at Danny Kay’s 2013 trial was only shown doctored transcripts of crucial Facebook chats between Mr Kay and his accuser.

In an exclusive interview with the MoS, Mr Kay said archived versions of the original messages proving he had consensual sex with his accuser

were found by his sister-in-law, Sarah Maddison. When she showed the Facebook exchange to the officer in charge of the investigation, he said: ‘How did you know how to find the messages and we didn’t?’

By then, Mr Kay had spent three months in jail. It would be another three years before his conviction was overturned. The Appeal Court heard earlier this month that police relied on an ‘edited and misleading’ account of the Facebook conversation that was given to them by the complainant in the weeks after she claimed she was raped by Mr Kay.

Earlier his month, The Mail on Sunday reported that a rape case against student Liam Allan collapsed after it was revealed that police had withheld vital phone messages from his accuser.

Mr Kay, 26, said: ‘Even now, with the conviction quashed, I still can’t believe that it took years of pain and stress for this nightmare to end. And the terrifying thought is that if the police and justice system could fail me like this, it could happen to anyone.

While he waited for his appeal, Mr Kay remained locked up with sex offenders. He was also made to see a psychiatrist because he was judged to be ‘in denial’ because of his protestations of innocence.
At his trial at Derby Crown Court, Mr Kay’s accuser said there had been little contact between them after sex.

The jury was given a misleading impression of a message reading ‘sorry’, which was construed as being about the alleged rape. In fact, it was a response to the woman asking him why he was ignoring her. Also omitted from the version presented to the jury was her response