Cross Hands taxi passenger groped female driver6:10am Saturday 2nd June 2012 A 43-year-old Cross Hands man repeatedly groped a female taxi driver while telling her it was the reason she had taken the job.
Stephen Pemberton, of 22 Bancyfynnon, got in the taxi outside the Cross Hands Hotel at 3.40am on March 4, but within a few hundred yards reached over the seat and groped the female driver, Llanelli magistrates were told.
Peter Lloyd, prosecuting, described to the court that each time the driver had attempted to push him away, Pemberton repeated the act, forcefully squeezing her breast until she was in pain.
Pemberton told her: “This is why women do this job. That’s what they want.”
Mr Lloyd told how the terrified driver was able to turn the car around and head back to the hotel while calling ahead to arrange for someone to meet her there to deal with Pemberton.
“She felt scared,” said Mr Lloyd.
In interview, Permberton initially denied the allegation, but later claimed he had no recollection of the incident because he had been drinking.
Peter Rees Jones, defending, told magistrates that Pemberton was “completely taken aback by the allegations against him”.
He added that Pemberton could remember nothing of the incident – apart from walking home after being taken back to the hotel by the driver.
“He has no recollection,” said Mr Rees Jones, “but he does not challenge her evidence and accepts that it must be the truth.”
Pemberton pleaded guilty to a charge of assault on a female in that he had intentionally touched her sexually without her consent.
Magistrates adjourned sentencing for the completion of probation reports, but warned Pemberton that all options would remain open to them, including sentencing him to a term in prison.
Pemberton will appear before magistrates for sentence on June 15.
Source; http://www.southwalesguardian.co.uk/new ... le_driver/