A middle-aged man accused of breaking into a house decades ago and raping a teenage girl at knifepoint has gone on trial.

Peter Baldwin was arrested in January this year after the “cold case” was reviewed and police made a DNA match with the victim.

The 56-year-old married man at first gave a prepared statement saying: “I have no knowledge of, and did not take part in, the rape of (girl’s name).”

But Baldwin, who was living in Hollybush Road, Gravesend, at the time, now claims the teenage girl invited him into her home in Sittingbourne and consented to sex.

Now of Camberley, Surrey, he denies aggravated burglary with intent to rape, rape, three charges of indecent assault and making threats to kill.

Maidstone Crown Court heard the teenager was home alone for the night in the 'eighties, as her divorced mother had gone to visit her boyfriend.

She had been in bed about 10 minutes when she heard footsteps on the stairs.

Prosecutor Kali Kaol QC said the intruder had taken a knife from the kitchen and gone to the bedroom.

He held the knife to the terrified girl’s stomach and throat and told her: “If you don’t do what I say I will use it. Don’t scream and don’t make a noise or you’re dead.”

He ordered her to undress, then sexually assaulted her and forced her to perform a sex act on him.

At one point he told her: “Hit me, hit me.” He slapped her twice across the face and she punched him on the leg.

"Don’t scream and don’t make a noise or you’re dead" - Peter Baldwin, according to court evidence

He asked her how old she was and whether she was on the pill. He put the knife on a side cabinet, warning her not to try to grab it.

She begged him not to rape her, but her told her: “It’s either rape or you die.”

Miss Kaol said after raping the victim, he told her: “This had better not get out. I had better not hear this anywhere. I will kill you if it does.”

She replied: “I promise I won’t say anything. I don’t want to die.”

She heard him walk down the stairs and out of the back door. She then ran to a neighbour and the police were called.

Miss Kaol said Baldwin had been working in the area at the time for a mechanical services company based in Sidcup.

The case was reviewed and the connection was made with him from swabs taken from the girl in the 'eighties.

Miss Kaol said the chances of the DNA match being someone other than Baldwin was one in a billion.

The trial continues.