Former Taunton Town football club chief admits offences linked to the drugging and rape of a woman by her husband

Karl Lindsay, 56, a married father of five who had worked his way up from kit manager to chief executive at Taunton Town Football Club, pleaded guilty at Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court to administering stupefying substances and two other serious sexual offences against a woman whose husband had been raping her for years. From her seat in the public gallery, the victim watched intently as Lindsay entered his pleas. Judge Maurice Greene remanded Lindsay in custody pending sentencing at the conclusion of the trial.

The woman's husband, who cannot be named, has pleaded guilty to 62 offences against his wife, among them multiple rapes spanning more than 20 years.

Three other men — Graham Brougham, 74, Keith Fotheringham, 59, and Sean Peers, 38 — have also pleaded guilty to sexual offences against the same woman.

Nine further defendants — among them an ambulance paramedic who was photographed with Prince Harry, a former nightclub DJ, a football coach working with children, and a taxi driver — are due on trial from Monday.