A FORMER Butlin’s employee has been banned from the site and sent on a sex offenders’ course after he gatecrashed a Big Weekend party and carried out a humiliating assault on a guest.

Rico Zempt got into the holiday camp at Minehead by bribing a holidaymaker to let him borrow a wristband and then went into an after show party where he tried to chat up the young victim.

She made it clear she did not want sex but after he had taken her outside he kissed her and tried to slide his hand down her trousers. She pushed him away but he grabbed her, spun her around, and held her as he touched her private parts.

She was so shocked that she did not report it to security for a few hours but Zempt was then arrested and denied the offence, only admitting it when the case reached Taunton Crown Court. 

In a victim personal statement, the victim said she had been badly affected and is still cautious about new relationships.

Zempt, 27, of Holloway Street, Minehead, admitted assault by penetration and was sent on a 35 session sex offenders course as part of a three-year community order by Judge Stephen Climie, sitting at Exeter Crown Court.

He put him on the sex offenders’ register, imposed a restraining order banning him from going to Butlin’s or contacting the victim for five years, and ordered him to pay £1,000 compensation, do 200 hours or unpaid community work and 25 days of rehabilitation activities.

He told him: “Almost certainly, a combination of alcohol and stupidity resulted in your case going disgracefully too far. 

“Of course people have a good time when they are out and about and find themselves in friendly exchanges of what is sometimes referred to as sexual banter, but that is a million miles from a green light to physically manhandle, let alone penetrate, a potential someone.”

 The judge told Zempt he would have gone to prison if the victim had been forced to give evidence at a trial and that he would go straight inside if he failed to comply with the community order.

Mr Brian Fitzherbert, prosecuting, said Zempt had worked previously at Butlins in Minehead and went back there for the Big Weekend party between February 11 to 13, 2022.

He met the victim and a friend at the event and they got on well at first until the two women realised he had been using the same chat-up patter on both of them. She had made it quite clear she did not want to take him home.

He tried to put his hand down her trousers at the start of the assault but she pushed him off saying ‘no chance’. He persisted, swung her around and held her as he put his fingers inside her underwear. 

Mr Ian Morrell, defending, said Zempt is remorseful. He has caring responsibilities for an elderly relative but plans to move to Birmingham and start work as a tarmacker to pay compensation.