A MAN accused of a brutal sex attack after DNA linked him to the crime told a court yesterday: "I did not rape her".

Mark Wilkinson, 25, was arrested after a DNA swab taken when he was cautioned for urinating in the street was matched to a savage rape in Roker, Sunderland, on December 31, 1995.

But the former salesman told Newcastle Crown Court yesterday: "I would never rape anybody in my life."

During police questioning Wilkinson said he had never had sex outdoors with a stranger in the past.

But after he was presented with DNA evidence, which showed that the chances of it being anyone else were a billion to one, he remembered having consensual sex with a woman he had just met in the street.

Wilkinson told the court that his recollection of the sex with the stranger was still hazy due to the passing years.

He said: "It didn't mean much, one-night-stands normally don't, but at the same time I know I didn't do anything wrong. She wasn't distressed in any way at all.

When asked about using foul and abusive language towards the 19-year-old, he said: "I would never say that to anybody.

"I'm a respectable young man and always have been."

Wilkinson, of Roker Baths Road, Sunderland, denies rape.

The trial continues.