A convicted murderer, rapist and serial sex attacker was given a volunteer role at a Wembley community centre by a councillor who said she had no idea of his criminal past.
One of Britain’s longest serving prisoners, Ronald Evans – dubbed the ‘Clifton Rapist’ – was allowed to volunteer at Chalkhill Community Centre after he was released from prison on parole. He was later found guilty of sexually assaulting a vulnerable woman he met there and sentenced to a further four years behind bars.
The mental health drop-in session was run by the Barnhill ward councillor, Kathleen Fraser, who later went on to become Brent’s Labour Deputy Mayor. She claims to have not been aware of his previous offending, denies dissuading the victim from reporting the attack and says acting as a witness in his defence at his trial was done “to assist the judicial process”.
The allegations surrounding Cllr Fraser’s actions have emerged after she quit the party last month, one day before Labour’s National Constitutional Committee ruled that the allegations detailed in a complaint from the sex assault victim surrounding Cllr Fraser’s actions “were upheld”. They concluded that Cllr Fraser, who now sits as an independent councillor and is contesting the May 2026 election as such, would have been expelled from the party had she not quit.
She’d been suspended last year while the investigation was ongoing, after the victim made a complaint to Labour in 2024 – about two years after the sex assault, and a year after Evans was convicted and jailed.
Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS), the victim claimed that Cllr Fraser tried to dissuade her from reporting the assault to the police. She further alleges that Cllr Fraser deleted messages in a local WhatsApp group when she tried to flag his conviction to others, and banned her from the community centre.
The victim – who was given automatic lifetime anonymity following the assault – said the experience has left her “a broken person”.
She told the LDRS: “I don’t know what it feels like to be happy anymore, I fear the damage is beyond repair. I’m a broken person […] the only thing I’ve got to hold on to is the truth.”
Evans raped and murdered Kathleen Heathcote in 1964 before committing numerous sexual attacks in Bristol in the late 70s. Avon and Somerset Police launched an undercover operation in January 1979, which saw young female and male officers setting “honeytraps” for Evans.
In March that year, police officer Michelle Leonard was grabbed by a man who told her “Don’t scream or I’ll kill you”. Her assailant turned out to be Evans, who went on to admit five attacks. He was jailed for 39 years.
The now 85-year-old was released in 2018, but was jailed again in 2023 after sexually assaulting the victim in Wembley in 2022. The victim has described feeling “deeply let down” by Cllr Fraser’s actions both in the immediate aftermath of the incident and in the subsequent years.
She described her relationship with Cllr Fraser prior to the incident as “friendly but not friends” after first meeting her through the local residents’ association, where Cllr Fraser was Chair, and before she was elected as a councillor in 2021. The victim thought of her as a “lovely, warm, caring person for the community”.
The victim had previously experienced domestic violence and after “suffering from the isolation of lockdown” decided to attend a mental health drop-in session run by Cllr Fraser at Chalkhill Community Centre in 2022. She said: “I just wanted friends. I didn’t want to be alone anymore.”
The fact that Cllr Fraser was the person running the drop-in influenced her decision to attend that session in particular as she believed her to be “trustworthy”. But the victim described the safeguarding measures in place at the community centre – which provided support for vulnerable people – as “non-existent and not a priority”.
Chalkhill Community Centre declined to comment when approached.
Evans volunteered at the centre, helping out with carrying crates and setting up for the food bank that operated from within it. The victim said there was no indication of his criminal history in the way he behaved there, describing him as “the life and soul of the party” and engaged with him as a way of making friends with the rest of the predominantly female group.
She said: “The women didn’t seem to be very forthcoming, maybe because I was new, but he was very friendly. He was very articulate, very clever, but very handsy with the women. […] One time he told me ‘I’m a very touchy-feely person’ and I replied ‘well, I’m not’.”
She said she was “put at ease” about Evans due to how he was thought of within the community.
After the session, the victim says she exchanged phone numbers with some people in attendance – including Evans. By the time she had got home that day, she said Evans had already started messaging her.
She told the LDRS that she had previously refused invitations to his house but eventually agreed to visit him at his home to sit in the garden where they “had a cup of tea and a light hearted chat” before she left. However, she said the second time she visited him “was different”.
Evans sexually assaulted her at his flat in July 2022, which she said left her feeling “violated, dirty, and with PTSD” (post traumatic stress disorder). She told the LDRS that she approached Cllr Fraser first after the assault because she saw her as “a prominent figure in the community and in a position of authority”. She said: “I thought she would support me in going to the police to report it.”
WhatsApp messages between the victim and Cllr Fraser show the councillor telling her: “Before you do that can you allow me to follow what we agreed because safeguards have been put in place since you kindly alerted us. I don’t want you to be any further bruised by a negative response from the police.”
A further message from Cllr Fraser reads: “It’s just gonna take a bot (sic) of time to sort this out. Try not to let yourself be anxious. We never leave people unsupervised when with us. People meeting up outside our spaces is trickier…I have it in hand.”
The victim said this made her feel as if she was being dissuaded from going to the police, saying: “I thought I’d better listen to her. […] I thought she knows what she’s talking about so I’ll leave it with her.”
She ended up going to the police herself a couple of weeks later because she felt that nothing had been done. In an act of “defiance” the victim still attended the centre after the assault as she “didn’t want to be silenced or forgotten about”. She claims Evans continued to volunteer at the centre throughout this time.
She said: “I was hoping that someone would come and give me a hug, say ‘sorry for what you went through’ and tell me everything was going to be okay. […] But there was nothing.”
Cllr Fraser told the LDRS: “I take any allegation of this nature extremely seriously. In July 2022, when [the victim] spoke to me, I encouraged her to seek appropriate support in reporting the matter to the police.
“I did not discourage her from contacting the police at any time. At that stage, I understood that the incident described had taken place outside of any community activity I was involved in, and I was not aware of the individual’s background or any relevant restrictions.
“As such, I did not have the authority or information required to take formal action beyond encouraging the matter to be reported.
“Once the matter was reported, I fully cooperated with the police investigation and provided a formal statement. I later attended court when called as a witness and gave evidence to assist the judicial process.
“Throughout, my focus has been on encouraging appropriate reporting, supporting those involved, and acting responsibly within the limits of my role in the community. Given that this matter has been subject to a criminal process, I am not able to comment further on specific details.”
The victim described continuing to have to see Evans as “exhausting” but wanted to show him she was “not scared” even though she was. She then gave a statement to the police but said nothing happened until she was at home watching the news when a segment about the ‘Clifton Rapist’ was aired.
She immediately recognised Evans and informed the police. She told the LDRS that Wembley Police called her the next day and the case was quickly referred to the serious sexual offences unit.
Throughout the process, including even after Evans had been found guilty in court, the victim described being “ostracised by the community” and claimed Cllr Fraser had “vouched for Evans’ character”. She claimed being “shunned and branded a liar” by the local community left her feeling “deeply wounded and hurt”.
She added: “If looks could kill I’d be dead a million times. […] But I refuse to be run out of my home town.”
An email from a police officer involved in the case confirmed that Cllr Fraser acted as a witness for the defence team during Evans’ trial at Hendon Nightingale Court on November 6, 2023.
The victims described Cllr Fraser’s actions as “cold and cruel”. She said: “Instead of compassion, she showed me contempt. […] I need to know why, I need it to make sense.”
Cllr Fraser refutes the allegations made against her and claims the process of the Labour investigation was “flawed and lacked transparency”. She also suggested the timing of it – not long after she was appointed Deputy Mayor – was done to cause “maximum damage” to her personally and her standing within the community.
Since Evans’ conviction, the victim said she feels people still don’t believe her. She said: “What is the wrong I’ve done? I did this for me, for the previous victims, and for women living in our community to keep us safe. I’ve been plunged into a nightmare I can’t wake up from. This is it, this is my life.”
