A sexual predator who subjected a woman student at Bradford University to a terrifying attack has been jailed for almost nine years.

Aneel Fazal's behaviour had caused police so much concern that he was monitored following his release from a previous prison sentence. Bradford Crown Court heard yesterday that in the months leading up to the attack in April, police officers had stopped the 22-year-old on several occasions as he wandered around in the early hours close to student accommodation.

His record also revealed that he had previously burgled a single mum's home, leaving an obscene message on a mirror, and had broken into a house occupied by female students.

Judge James Stewart QC praised the vigilance of the police after hearing how Fazal was arrested within hours of the sex attack and DNA taken from one of his gloves matched saliva from the victim.

Fazal, of Cloudsdale Avenue, West Bowling, climbed into the victim's first-floor room through a window she had left open.

Prosecutor Nicholas Lumley told the court how the 26-year-old woman was woken from her sleep by a noise in the early hours and saw a dark hooded figure in her room at the university halls of residence. Fazal forced her back on to her bed and indecently assaulted her. As she struggled, he was eventually disturbed by the noise of other students in the corridor and fled through the open window.

Mr Lumley said following the attack the traumatised student was forced to move away from Bradford and though she continued to study at the university, failed her exams. She described herself as feeling "absolutely filthy".

Fazal pleaded guilty to indecent assault and burglary. Yesterday he was sentenced to a total of eight and a half years for those offences and ordered to serve an extra five months which was outstanding from his last jail term.

Fazal, who had no previous convictions for sex offences, will also have to register as a sex offender with the police for the rest of his life.

After the hearing, Detective Sergeant Martin Taylor said: "The sentence protects females from attacks by a man we saw as extremely dangerous."