Plenty of Fish rapist Lee Savage jailed Published duration 23 July 2018

image copyright Cumbria Police image caption The prosecution said Lee Savage was a "violent sexual predator"

A "sexual sadist" has been jailed for raping three women he met through the internet dating website Plenty of Fish.

Lee Savage attacked females from Cumbria, South Tyneside and Dumfries and Galloway between 2015 and earlier this year.

The 25-year-old, of Skiddaw View, Penrith, originally denied a total of 10 offences of rape and sexual assault but then changed his plea to guilty.

He was given a life sentence and must serve a minimum of 11 years in jail.

Prosecutor Tim Evans told Carlisle Crown Court earlier that Savage was a "persuasive and manipulative man as well as a violent sexual predator" who had carried out a "planned and persistent rape campaign".

In a statement, one of his victims said he had "violated my whole life".

The court heard the first rape, in January of 2015, was committed less than four months after Savage was given a community order for sending explicit images to a 13-year-old girl he had befriended on Facebook.

Sentencing him for his latest crimes, Judge James Adkin told him: "You are, in my judgement, a sexual sadist."

Savage initially claimed each of the women had consented to sex, but he changed his plea after facing "overwhelming evidence", Isla Chilton, of the Crown Prosecution Service, said.

He must also sign the sex offenders register for life.