Sex offender and convicted domestic abuser cleared over 12-year campaign of terror

A convicted sex offender has been cleared of a 12-year-long campaign of terror towards women and children.

James Cunliffe, who is also a convicted domestic abuser, was accused of abusing three women and three children.

Prosecutors claimed the 37-year-old, who is the subject of a five-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order, repeatedly raped two women and assaulted a third.

He had gone on trial at the High Court in Kilmarnock facing 22 charges of abusing his alleged victims from 2010 to 2022 at addresses in Lockerbie and Dumfries.

But eight charges were dropped during the trial, and he walked free from court today, Wednesday, January 28, 2026, when the jury cleared him of the remaining 14 charges. 

Due to legal rules, the jury at the High Court in KIlmarnock were unaware he was convicted of domestic abuse in 2023 and convicted of a sexual offence last year.

He was spared jail over both of those cases at Dumfries Sheriff Court.

The sexual offence case saw him exposing himself to three people - one of whom was a 15-year-old girl - and masturbating.

He was placed on a Community Payback Order for that case and ordered to attend the Moving Forward, Making Changes programme, which helps sex offenders change their ways. 

Earlier this week, he told the jury he could not keep his hands off one of the women he was accused of repeatedly raping.

He denies regularly forcing himself on the woman, repeatedly raping another woman and abusing the three children over the 12-year-period.

When asked by Advocate Depute David McDonald if he was "besotted" and "smitten" with the woman in question, he replied: "Totally. I was completely and wholly in love with her."

And when asked by the prosecutor if he could leave her alone, he said: "No."

He also admitted that he messaged the woman, who can't be named for legal reasons, asking for sex "a lot".

But he denied raping her, claiming the sexual interactions between them were consensual.

Cunliffe was also accused of regularly assaulting a boy for 13 years, performing a sex act in the presence of a woman and making intimate images of an underage girl.

He also denied assaulting the same youngster, performing a sex act in front of her, assaulting a third child, and assaulting another woman.

He was alleged to have targeted the boy between July 2010 and November 2020 at an address in Lockerbie and four different addresses in Dumfries, when the youngster was aged between two and 13.

Prosecutors claimed Cunliffe, of Dumfries, repeatedly grabbed the boy, pushed and pulled him, grabbed him by the neck and pushed him against a wall.

He was also accused of repeatedly raping the first woman in her sleep between 2013 and 2017, and repeatedly raping her between 2017 and 2020, and he was also accused of regularly sexually assaulting her between the same dates.

Prosecutors also claimed that he intentionally exposed himself to the woman and performed a sex act on himself in front of her without her consent.

And he was accused of taking images of the underage girl, who also can't be named for legal reasons, "in a state of undress".

He was also accused of assaulting her to her injury, recording her in a state of undress and exposing himself to her.

And he was also accused of assaulting another girl when she was aged between seven and nine.

The indictment stated he repeatedly raped and sexually assaulted the woman he says he was "besotted" with between 2020 and 2022.

And the final charge he faced was one of assaulting another woman, by pushing her and trying to punch her on the head in 2021.