Superdry co-founder James Holder found guilty of rape

The co-founder of clothing firm Superdry is facing jail after being found guilty of raping a woman after a night out drinking.

James Holder, 54, had denied charges of assault by penetration and rape and said what sexual activity took place between them was consensual.

A jury at Gloucester Crown Court, sitting in Cirencester, acquitted Holder of assault by penetration but found him guilty of rape.

The court heard the woman was attacked in the early hours of May 7, 2022, after a night out at a bar in Cheltenham.

Holder and a friend had gone back to her home uninvited, and he attacked her after waking from a short nap on her bed.

Giving evidence, the woman said she was crying and asking the married father of two to stop, but he carried on.

The ordeal ended when she managed to escape the bedroom, and Holder left her home a short time later.

Under cross-examination, Holder denied the reason he had gone to the woman’s home was that he “saw an opportunity to have sex with her”.

James Haskell, prosecuting, asked: “You saw something you wanted and you took it, because the truth is that when you got to the doorway of the living room you said something like: ‘What’s happening, is everything all right?’ as you wanted to entice her to the bedroom and that’s why you said: ‘Can you show me?’

“It ended because she managed to escape off the bed.”

Holder replied: “That’s not correct. She fell straight to sleep. She was fast asleep, so I popped my clothes on and left.”

Mr Haskell was asked: “Is the truth that it suddenly dawned on you of the reality of what you had just done, and you wanted to get out of the flat as soon as possible?”

Holder replied: “No, not true.”

The defendant, of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, was remanded into custody ahead of sentencing.