A serial paedophile from West Norwood has been jailed for at least five and a half years for a sickening knife-point rape on a homeless teenager.

Roy King lured the unsuspecting 18-year-old on to a bus bound for his former home in Truslove Road by promising him a bed for the night.

Croydon Crown Court was today told King had a string of previous convictions, including many for sexual assaults on boys as young as six.

He cannot apply for parole until he has spent five and a half years behind bars and could end up serving much longer.

Judge Timothy Stow QC said King represented a "serious danger to young males".

On July 29 last year King took a 149 bus to Norwood with the teenager but lured him into Crystal Palace Park and raped him.

The 46-year-old then calmly caught a train from Crystal Palace to West Norwood with his terrified victim. The court heard before he left the train he turned to the teenager and said: "Remember, this didn't happen."

His victim was so traumatised he attempted to commit suicide by taking an overdose of pills two days later.

Judge Stow added: " This was a very nasty and serious case of rape, given the fact that you went out armed with a knife and went to considerable lengths to lure the young man to a quiet wood where you could rape him undisturbed."

The judge added King had gone to Charing Cross with the deliberate intention of targeting vulnerable young men.