A BONDAGE lover, accused of having a vampire fetish, has been cleared of raping two women.

Luke McCarthy, 28, sucked one woman’s blood after carving a cross in his chest, it was claimed in court.

But he insisted that any sexual activity he had with either woman was consensual.

Jurors at Southwark Crown Court agreed and cleared him of four counts of rape in relation to two women, between 2009 and 2013.

Mr McCarthy was alleged to have raped the first woman on two separate occasions at his parents’ house in Southend between August and October 2009.

The father-of-one rejected claims he had tied the woman up in his cupboard and made her sleep with her head in a cage on his floor.

He admitted once whipping a woman with a bamboo cane from his parents’ garden, but denied using the whip on this particular woman.

The court heard that although a “blood-swapping ritual” took place it was merely “symbolic” and Mr McCarthy denied having any sort of fetish.

In an interview with police one of the women claimed: “He has this vampire fetish – he cut his chest in the shape of a cross and blood came out.

Yet Mr McCarthy claimed he certainly did not have a vampire fetish.

He told police: “Not to the degree of I like going out neck biting people and stuff like that - it’s unhygienic.

“It’s not a delusion of reality, it’s not a role play environment.”

He added that the exchange of blood was “something I don’t do regularly”.

He added that the exchange of blood was something he didn’t do regularly.

Mr McCarthy, of Dorset Road, Vauxhall, London, met a second woman at Vauxhall’s goth and fetish Antichrist Club.

He claimed throughout sex was consensual and that a vampire act was “symbolic” so that the pair would have a “special” connection. Asked if S&M dominated his sex life he replied: “At the moment, yes.

“One of the things about the dynamics involved in that is the person who has the most power is actually the submissive person.”

McCarthy told jurors the second woman agreed to role play and everything that happened with the first was part of a “master and slave” agreement.