A Stirling businessman has been spared jail after a sheriff said his charitable reputation had been damaged by being convicted of sexually assaulting a young woman he met in a bar.
Society wine merchant Douglas Wood – whose WoodWinters stores offer wine to “high profile clients” at nearly £2,000 a bottle – returned with his 20-year-old victim to his luxury home in Bridge of Allan.
They went into his bedroom by which time the woman, who had become separated from her friends on a night out, was too intoxicated to consent.
Assault details
Wood, 51, a former World Wine Awards judge and a Scottish and UK wine retailer of the year, stripped and lay down beside her, and “assisted in removing her lower clothing” until she was naked from the waist down. He then sexually assaulted her.
Falkirk Sheriff Court heard that the incident ended after her then boyfriend, who had been looking for her on his Life360 tracking app, alerted her friends who realised she needed help and went to collect her.
Wood, of Wellpark House, Bridge of Allan, appeared for sentence on Tuesday after being found guilty by a jury last month of the sexual assault.
Defence and mitigation
Wood had denied the charge, saying the woman had consented and had not been too intoxicated to do so, and that as soon as she had asked to leave he had walked her beyond his gates into the street and had seen her safely into a car where her friends were waiting.
The verdict was by majority and the jury deleted allegations that he had supplied his victim with a drug and that the assault had been committed with intent to rape.
The incident occurred on September 21, 2024.
Advocate Graham Macdonald, defending, produced supporting letters from celebrity-backed homelessness charity Social Bite and Sense Scotland. He said WoodWinters had been a corporate fundraising partner for both charities and had 33 employees on its payroll in Bridge of Allan, Inverness and Edinburgh who could be affected by Wood’s reputational damage.
He said Wood continued to deny wrongdoing but accepted he had “lessons to be learned”. He said: “Mr Wood is a pro-social, successful educated gentleman. He is a well-known figure in his local community. He is a man of means. He is now a registered sex offender. Being seen to do unpaid work in the community, being seen to wear a tag, would be punitive.”
He said a restriction of movement order would be a “salutary reminder” for Wood, and “curtail his enjoyment of foreign travel and ability to participate in business meetings”.
Sentence
Sheriff Craig Harris sentenced Wood, who had no previous convictions other than for speeding, is suffering from cancer, and was assessed as a low risk for re-offending, to 250 hours of unpaid work.
He also imposed a restriction of movement order confining him to his home between 8pm and 6am daily for six months, and placed him on social work supervision and the sex offenders’ register for two years.
He warned him that the community sentence was a direct alternative to prison.
He said: “You met the 20-year-old complainer by chance when both of you were respectively having nights out in Bridge of Allan. You returned together to your home and went to your bedroom.
“Given the jury’s verdict and the evidence, she was by this point unable to consent to anything due to her level of intoxication, but you went on to commit the offence which was opportunistic in nature.
“You undressed yourself and assisted in removing her lower clothing so she was naked from the waist down. Laying down next to her on your bed you stroked her arm, legs and lower stomach and touched her on the vagina. There was no penetration.
“Ultimately her friends came to collect her having been alerted by her then boyfriend that she required help.”
He said he took account that the jury had deleted “very significant” aggravations in the charge – that his actions were committed with intent to rape, and that he had supplied her with a drug which in the circumstances would have suggested he was attempting to stupefy her.
He said that but for these deletions, a custodial sentence would have been “inevitable”. He said the deletions potentially brought the case into the sphere of a matter which might have been prosecuted under summary complaint – rather than under the more serious sheriff and jury procedure – and he took account of Wood’s health issues.
He said: “I also take account of the impact the conviction will have upon you and your business in which you employ a significant number of people. The social work report notes that your professional reputation is a part of that business and you work with a number of high profile clients. You have been placed on the sex offenders’ register.
“You seem to be someone who values their reputation and you had – as the fundraising letters show – been someone who had been highly thought of in charitable circles. Your opportunistic actions will have deep and lasting repercussions on that reputation, both professionally and personally.
“I must take account of the provisions whereby no custodial sentence can be imposed unless the court considers no other method appropriate, and of the presumption against imposing a sentence of 12 months imprisonment or less.”
Wood’s business, established more than 20 years, has shops in Edinburgh, Inverness and Bridge of Allan, a head office in Stirling, a wholesale business, and an online trade, calls itself an “importer, wholesaler and retailer of wines, whiskies and artisan spirits from around the globe”.
