A Far-Right thug who stood as a BNP and National Front candidate in two elections is facing a substantial prison sentence for violently raping a woman and attempting to rape her teenage daughter.
A jury heard particularly distressing evidence that former soldier Michael Coyle humiliated his 39-year-old victim by using a craft knife to carve the word “s***” into her thigh; “w****” into her arm; “old” and “saggy” on her breasts, and the letters “FAT” across her stomach.
Tattooed Coyle, 40, who also rubbed the woman’s face against a rough wall leaving a burn-like mark on her cheek, was further convicted of wilfully ill-treating her children by forcing them to stand in a cold dark room for hours and of assaulting two of her sons by presenting a knife at them and hitting one of them on the face.
He was due to be sentenced at the High Court in Livingston on Monday after earlier being remanded in custody for background reports. However, when he appeared via a videolink from Addiewell Prison, West Lothian, the court was told that no-one had got in touch to interview him for a criminal justice social work report.
Coyle’s defence counsel Mark Stewart QC said: “No responsibility for that falls on Mr Coyle. He’s not been contacted. He’s anxious for the matter to proceed as soon as possible.”
Mr Stewart tendered two letters to the court in mitigation and said a new date for sentencing had been identified as 6 September at Edinburgh High Court.
Judge Alison Stirling, who earlier described the violent and controlling abuser’s case as “complex and harrowing”, adjourned the case until then.
She said: “It’s unfortunate the criminal justice social work report is not available. It was through no fault of Mr Coyle and, as far as I’m aware, it’s not the fault of the court either.
“I hope we can have that chased up and the report will be available when he appears in front of me again on 6 September in Edinburgh.”
Giving evidence against Coyle at his trial the mum-of-five told how he didn’t allow her to go out or see friends.
She said she was “on a stopwatch” any time she left the house with violent consequences if she returned late.
She claimed he raped her after accusing her of cheating on him when she returned home late from a girls’ night out.
She said he sent messages from her Facebook account to a photographer who'd taken her picture in a rock pub saying: “Did I flirt with you? I can’t remember.” Then asking if the stranger was interested in her.
Then, she said, as she was lying on the couch he started hitting her in the face with his manhood.
She told the court: “He was saying things like ‘This is what you want isn’t it, you little s***? This is what you wanted all night.’
“He kicked me in the stomach and then he told me to get back through to bed. I thought ‘That’s over’, but it wasn’t over.”
She went on: “He pushed me backwards onto the couch. He started doing that thing with his penis again saying that’s what I wanted and I was going to get it – I was going to get my wish.
“He started pushing my legs apart with his knees and I screamed but he just covered my mouth. I was on my back on the couch and he was pushing his forearm down into my face.
“He put himself inside me and he didn’t stop until he was finished. I couldn’t fight back.”
She said she once tried to flee from the house half naked but he rugby tackled her to the floor shattering her teeth so badly she lost four on one side of her mouth and two on the other.
Her daughter, now aged 18, testified that the car bodyshop worker of Livingston, West Lothian, sexually assaulted her when she was around 12 or 13 years-old.
She told how she woke up and found him straddling her, naked from waist down, and attempting to insert his penis into her mouth.
Coyle, who has had his name added to the sex offenders’ register, stood for election to Westminster as the BNP candidate in Glasgow South in 2010 and fought as National Front candidate to become a Member of the Scottish Parliament for the Linlithgow constituency.
He failed on both counts.
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