A courtroom scuffle broke out as two men were led to the cells after being found guilty of viciously raping a young woman in Whitehaven.

Angry families of the victim and one of defendents had to be separated after Stuart Milne and Terry Parry were convicted of rape in the town’s St Nicholas Gardens after an eight-day trial at Carlisle Crown Court.

Milne sat with his head in his hands while Parry shook his head in disbelief as the jury of six women and five men delivered their verdict. The 12th member of the jury was absent yesterday.

Milne and Parry, of separate addresses on Bow Fell Road, Whitehaven, had vehemently denied the raping the 18-year-old were being sentenced today. Milne, 37, also faced a second allegation of sexual assault which he also denied. The jury found him not guilty of the offence.

Parry, 30, wearing a grey suit and white shirt, shouted “This is a joke” from the dock after the verdicts were read out. The pair were remanded in custody overnight and were due to reappear before Judge Peter

Hughes QC this morning for sentence.

Earlier in the trial, the court was told that the woman had called 999 during her ordeal. Andrew Ford, for the prosecution, said that she did not know either man before their paths crossed outside a Whitehaven pub on the night of June 29 last year.

The jury was told that the woman had accepted several drinks from the men, before she was kissed by Milne in the street.

Mr Ford said that the woman, who can not be named for legal reasons, was then pulled into the walled St Nicholas’ Garden area.

“Mr Milne had sex with her against her will,” he said.

“A feature of the case is that she was holding her phone. She didn’t consent to sex and she rang the police during the act. “You cannot decipher everything that is said, but it is possible to hear her clearly saying ‘get off, get off us.’”

In his evidence, Milne said that the sex was consensual and that the victim also asked Parry if he wanted sex. Parry told the trial that he had not done anything illegal with the victim and that he had responded when she made sexual advances towards him.