Predatory paramedic who raped patient in her own home and sexually assaulted underage girl jailed
A "predatory" paramedic who raped a patient in her own home, sexually assaulted a girl under 13 and attacked another woman in the back of his ambulance has been jailed.
Andrew Wheeler was on duty when he was called to help a woman who collapsed at her friend's house.
He drove her to her own place where he raped and sexually assaulted her in the 2008 attack.
The following year, he raped another woman when she was not a patient, then sexually assaulted her in his ambulance in 2010.
He was sentenced to 21 years behind bars at Peterborough Crown Court on Friday.
Judge Matthew Lowe said Wheeler was a "manipulative sexual predator" and displayed "arrogance and a belief that he was untouchable and protected, as he saw it, by his paramedic’s uniform".
Read more: Shocking moment police officer screams for help as teenage driver drags him 30ft
Jurors heard Wheeler, a paramedic from Warboys in Cambridgeshire, was "abusing the trust that an NHS uniform brings with it".
In the 2008 incident, he assured two other paramedics who arrived to help the collapsed woman – who was clearly drunk – that he had it under control, then took her home.
After raping and sexually assaulting her at her house, he said "something about losing his job and nobody would believe her as she was an alcoholic", prosecutor Noel Casey said.
However, the woman reported it to police and he was arrested. She said in a victim impact statement: “I have no faith in the NHS and I’ve avoided seeing a paramedic and attending the hospital just because of what happened.”
The other woman – neither can be named for legal reasons – had called 999 after suffering breathing difficulties.
Read more: Police apologise to mum fined for taking daughter for a walk on the beach
Casey said he touched her breasts while administering adrenalin and said "that’s not the first time I've had to jab you with something".
In total, Wheeler denied 18 sexual offences against four women and one girl.
Jurors convicted him of six sexual offences – the rape and sexual assault of two women and two counts of sexual assault of a child aged under 13, who was not a patient.
The 46-year-old was cleared of causing sexual activity without consent in respect of a third female patient, and and six counts of rape against another woman who was not a patient.
He was also made given an indefinite sexual harm prevention order, and the judge said Wheeler would never work as a paramedic or similar role again.
Watch: What you can and can't do in lockdown
