A 50-YEAR-old Ipswich man is due to appear in court today on five sex attack charges dating back to 1990.Detectives charged Phil Collins, of Dickens Road, with one count of rape, two counts of indecent assault and two counts of buggery on a 17-year-old female.

Colin Adwent

A 50-YEAR-old Ipswich man is due to appear in court today on five sex attack charges dating back to 1990.

Detectives charged Phil Collins, of Dickens Road, with one count of rape, two counts of indecent assault and two counts of buggery on a 17-year-old female.

The allegations relate to an attack which happened in Gippeswyk Park, Ipswich, near the town's railway station, on the night of Sunday, January 14, 1990.

Collins was remanded in custody after being charged yesterday afternoon following an investigation handled by Suffolk Police's major investigation team.

He is due to appear at South East Suffolk Magistrates' Court in Ipswich this morning for the first hearing of his case.

The charges he faces are indictable and therefore the case is likely to be transferred to the crown court at some stage.

On Wednesday morning police revealed they had arrested a man at 4.55am in Ipswich on suspicion of raping the teenager in 1990.

They also stated they were questioning the same man in connection with another rape, which occurred four years earlier on a woman said to be in her early 40s at the time.

That attack happened near woodland at Chesterton Close, in the Stoke Park area of Ipswich, around 1am on September 2, 1986.

No charges have been brought in relation to that attack.

However, a spokeswoman for Suffolk Constabulary said: “A 50-year old male has been bailed in relation to an incident in the Stoke Park area of Ipswich, which occurred in September 1986.”

Police have not said whether Collins is the man currently on bail for that assault.

Suffolk's major investigation team also double up as the county's cold case unit.

Last year police were known to be reviewing the January 1990 attack. The inquiry was codenamed Operation Atrium.