Alex Hepburn (born 21 December 1995) is a former

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

er from Australia and convicted sex offender, who last played for

Worcestershire County Cricket Club Worcestershire County Cricket Club is one of eighteen first-class county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the historic county of Worcestershire. Its Vitality Blast T20 team has been rebranded ...

in England. In April 2019, he was sentenced to five years'

imprisonment Imprisonment is the restraint of a person's liberty, for any cause whatsoever, whether by authority of the government, or by a person acting without such authority. In the latter case it is "false imprisonment". Imprisonment does not necessari ...

for the

rape Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without their consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or ag ...

of a sleeping woman as part of a

WhatsApp WhatsApp (also called WhatsApp Messenger) is an internationally available freeware, cross-platform, centralized instant messaging (IM) and voice-over-IP (VoIP) service owned by American company Meta Platforms (formerly Facebook). It allows us ...

-based "sexual conquest game". He was imprisoned at

HM Prison Littlehey HM Prison Littlehey is a Category C male prison in the village of Perry near Huntingdon in Cambridgeshire, England. Littlehey Prison is operated by His Majesty's Prison Service. The Prison only holds those that have been convicted of a sexual o ...

until October 2021.

Cricket career

A batting

all-rounder An all-rounder is a cricketer who regularly performs well at both batting and bowling. Although all bowlers must bat and quite a handful of batsmen do bowl occasionally, most players are skilled in only one of the two disciplines and are consi ...

, he bowled right-arm

medium pace Fast bowling (also referred to as pace bowling) is one of two main approaches to bowling in the sport of cricket, the other being spin bowling. Practitioners of pace bowling are usually known as ''fast'' bowlers, ''quicks'', or ''pacemen''. T ...

, and batted right-handed. He made his one-day debut for Worcestershire against

Leicestershire Leicestershire ( ; postal abbreviation Leics.) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East Midlands, England. The county borders Nottinghamshire to the north, Lincolnshire to the north-east, Rutland to the east, Northamptonshire t ...

in August 2015. He made his

Twenty20 Twenty20 (T20) is a shortened game format of cricket. At the professional level, it was introduced by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) in 2003 for the inter-county competition. In a Twenty20 game, the two teams have a single innin ...

cricket debut for Worcestershire in the 2017 NatWest T20 Blast on 5 August 2017.

Rape conviction

Conviction

On 9 November 2017, Hepburn was charged with one count of oral

, and one count of vaginal rape. Those charges were not confirmed to the public until 29 November 2017. Worcestershire County Cricket Club suspended Hepburn on full pay, but did not renew his contract when it expired at the end of September 2018. At Hepburn's trial in January 2019, the jury failed to reach a verdict, and as a result were discharged. He underwent a retrial in April 2019. During the trial Hepburn admitted he had sent "disgusting"

messages about a sexual conquest competition. Worcestershire County Cricket Club issued a statement saying that they were appalled by the details reported in the case. On April 12 he was convicted of one count of oral rape, but was acquitted of the vaginal rape charge. On 30 April 2019, Hepburn was sentenced to five years in prison, and placed on the

sex offenders register A sex offender registry is a system in various countries designed to allow government authorities to keep track of the activities of sex offenders, including those who have completed their criminal sentences. In some jurisdictions, registration i ...

for life.

Appeal

In May 2020, Hepburn appealed his conviction on the ground that it was an unsafe verdict. He was represented by David Emanuel QC. His appeal was made on two grounds. Ground one was that the WhatsApp messages were irrelevant and prejudicial to the trial, and ought not to have been admitted. The court rejected his submission, finding that the messages were relevant as important explanatory evidence, and relevant to an "important matter in issue between the parties, namely, belief in consent", as his attitudes toward consent were found to be relevant as to his likelihood of having committed the offence. The court also found that the prosecutor Ms Moore QC's questions relating to Hepburn's promiscuity were correctly objected to, but did not undermine the conviction. His second ground of appeal was that the jury's

acquittal In common law jurisdictions, an acquittal certifies that the accused is free from the charge of an offense, as far as criminal law is concerned. The finality of an acquittal is dependent on the jurisdiction. In some countries, such as the ...

of him having committed vaginal rape, was inconsistent with their verdict that he had committed oral rape. The court stated:

Even if one starts from the premise that the complainant was awake at the outset, the jury could be sure she did not appreciate that it was the appellant with whom she was having sex at the beginning, and that he had no genuine and reasonable belief that she was consenting, but that things might have changed the longer the sexual contact went on without any outward demonstration of a lack of consent (accepted by the complainant) it is at least possible that by the time vaginal intercourse started the jury's conclusion about the appellant's belief and whether it was reasonable was different. —Lord Chief Justice Burnett

As both arguments in support of an unsafe verdict finding failed, Hepburn's appeal against conviction was dismissed.

Release from prison

Hepburn was released from prison on 26 October 2021. Following this, Oswestry Cricket Club was approached by a third party about the possibility of Hepburn training and/or playing for the club the following season. The club's committee overwhelmingly voted against the proposal.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Hepburn, Alex 1995 births Living people Australian cricketers 21st-century Australian criminals Cricketers from Perth, Western Australia Criminals from Western Australia Australian people convicted of rape Australian people imprisoned abroad Worcestershire cricketers Prisoners and detainees of England and Wales Sportspeople convicted of crimes