Weekend rape report poses questions about safety - particularly of lone women - on North Wall

Fuller Street Bridge where the after-dark rape is alleged to have taken place 

DETECTIVES are carrying out extensive lines of enquiry as a part of an ongoing investigation into a reported rape in Cleethorpes at the weekend.

A woman reported she was walking along the footbridge near the North Wall in the direction of the seafront at around 9.40pm on Sunday night  when she was approached by a man walking a small dog.

She maintains he then raped her.

Ch Insp Jim Clough, of Humberside Police said: "This incident will be of extreme concern to the local community.

"I want to offer my reassurance that my officers are exploring all lines of inquiry.

"We have been speaking with witnesses, completing house-to- house inquiries and reviewing CCTV footage."

The man is described as being between 19 and 21, approximately 5ft 6 inches tall, clean shaven with short hair, wearing a grey tracksuit. 

Anyone with information is asked to call  101 quoting crime reference 25*25149 of 23 February.

The incident has occurred a fortnight after a reported robbery and assault, also in the vicinity of the North Wall.

At around 9.25pm on  Sunday  February 9, it was reported that two teenage boys approached a woman who was walking her dog. 

The teenagers are then believed to have made verbal threats, demanding that she hand over her dog. 

Subsequently one of the teenage boys is alleged to have punched the woman in the face before they both fled the scene.

The boys are thought to be 14 or 15 and around 5ft 3in tall.

The incident reference number is 25*18419.

The Grimsby News says: Both of these incidents will have caused extreme distress to the victims. They also throw the spotlight on the North Wall which is an eerie stretch of foreshore bordered by an ugly concrete wall and equally ugly palisade fencing. Even in daylight hours, it sometimes seems menacing because there is no easy place to escape if danger threatens. North East Lincolnshire Council is throwing shedloads of levelling-up money at the rest of revamping Cleethorpes seafront. In the unlikely event of there being any spare change, here's hoping it might be invested in making the North Wall a safer and more pleasing place for residents and visitors alike.