THIS is the face of a convicted rapist from Southend who has been jailed for six years.

Heine Esterhuizen, 25, of Royal Mews, had denied raping the woman in the town in 2017.

But following a trial at Basildon Crown Court, he was found unanimously guilty of three counts of rape.

He was acquitted on one count of causing actual bodily harm.

Judge Samantha Cohen, who addressed Esterhuizen as he shook with nerves in the dock, said that his defence that nothing had happened was "ludicrous" when looking at messages that showed he asked the victim to take the morning after pill.

She said: "You wanted sex and she did not.

"You decided you would have sex with her whether she liked it or not.

“The next morning you tried to pretend that nothing happened.”

Esterhuizen was jailed for a total of six years nine months.

The court heard he is likely to face deportation back to his home country of South Africa following his sentence.