A man has been charged with rape after an alleged attack police have said they are treating as racially aggravated.<\/p>\n
Officers are investigating an attack on a woman in her 20s in Walsall, in the West Midlands, on Saturday evening.<\/p>\n
West Midlands police said: \u201cJohn Ashby, who is a white British man aged 32 from Stockland Green (Birmingham), has been charged this evening with rape and remanded to appear before Birmingham magistrates court tomorrow.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was also charged with sexual assault, strangulation, racially aggravated actual bodily harm and robbery. It follows the rape of a woman in her 20s who was attacked in the Park Hall area of Walsall on Saturday night.\u201d<\/p>\n
The suspect was arrested just before 7am on Monday in the Perry Barr area of Birmingham.<\/p>\n
Police are trying to reassure communities after the attack. Ch Supt Phil Dolby, of Walsall police, said: \u201cWe know the fear and concern this attack has caused in our communities. We continue to speak to people in the community to listen to and understand their concerns.<\/p>\n
\u201cOfficers have visited faith establishments in Walsall and spoken with local leaders about women\u2019s safety and what measures men can take to make women feel more comfortable.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need to continue to maintain those conversations and how we build on women\u2019s safety in the community.\u201d<\/p>\n
Det Supt Ronan Tyrer, from the force\u2019s public protection unit, said: \u201cThe woman who was the subject of the attack has been informed of the charging decision this evening. She is continuing to be supported by our specially trained officers.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A man has been charged with rape after an alleged attack police have said they are treating as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":230743,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-230742","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230742","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=230742"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230742\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/230743"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=230742"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=230742"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=230742"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}