Man Accused of Forcing People to Wear Dog Collars and Puppy Masks While Beating and Raping Them

Accused of Sex Attacks on a Woman and a Man

Scott Lannister, 34, of Stirling, has gone on trial accused of forcing people to wear dog collars and puppy masks while beating and raping them. Lannister, who is represented by Bert Kerrigan KC, pleads not guilty to a total of six charges. The woman, 21, whose evidence was pre-recorded and played to a jury said she had slept in a dog bed in a cupboard, been beaten by Lannister with a leather-stripped instrument called “the Scorpion”.

She said she met Lannister in 2019 and slept with him in his room, and after that in the cupboard. She told prosecutor John Keenan KC that “a point came” when Lannister began to do things to her which she had not consented to. She said: “I’d get hit with something he nicknamed ‘The Scorpion’.” She described this as a metal pole with leather strips and studs in the end.

She said Lannister would hit her “extremely hard” with The Scorpion although she’d be begging him not to and screaming for him to stop. She said this had started as “a consensual BDSM thing” but quickly turned into a non-consensual form of punishment. She said: “When it started getting extremely violent I definitely didn’t want that to happen.”

She said he forced her to wear a pup hood in public – basically just a dog-like mask made out of neoprene. Sometimes she’d wear a fuzzy clip-on tail. In June 2020, she said he put a rope round her neck attached to the ceiling then kicked away a stool she was standing on – even though she told him not to. She panicked, she said, then thought she must have blacked out, and woke up with one of her eyes swollen shut.

Police Found More Than 20 Dog Collars and Leads

The High Court in Stirling heard that when police searched Lannister’s flat in the city’s Mayfield Court they found more than 20 dog collars and leads, three “floggers”, a wooden baton, metal chains, two rubber dog masks and other items. Lannister, also known as Scott Hanlon, is said to have engaged in a course of abusive behaviour towards the woman and man.

It is alleged that he “caused” the woman to be suspended by a rope from the ceiling so that the rope compressed her throat and she lost consciousness, before cutting the rope so she fell onto the floor and struck her face. These offences are alleged to have taken place between September 1, 2019 and June 28, 2020.

Lannister is also alleged to have raped the man on various occasions between September 24 and December 18 last year. It is alleged that Lannister seized him by a dog collar he was then wearing on his neck before carrying out the alleged rapes. On one occasion it is alleged he annally raped the man while the alleged victim was having a epileptic fit.

Claims Sex Acts Were Consensual

In answer to questioning by Janice Green, junior counsel for Lannister, the woman agreed that in the beginning she had felt “happy and carefree when she was living as a puppy”. She agreed that she had told police in a statement: “When I’m a puppy it’s a happy, carefree space. I’m quite excitable when I’m a puppy.”

Referring to BDSM, Miss Green asked, “Is it right to say that sometimes pain is pleasure in that context?” The woman replied, “Um, yes.” The trial before Judge Lord Scott continues.