Gary Glitter convicted of sex offences against young girls

Former glam rock singer Gary Glitter is facing life in prison after being found guilty of a string of historic sexual abuse offences against three young girls.

The 70-year-old, real name Paul Gadd, was convicted by a jury of five men and seven women at Southwark Crown Court in London.

He was found guilty of one count of attempted rape, four counts of indecent assault, and one count of sexual intercourse with a girl under the age of 13.

Glitter raised his eyebrows and looked shocked in the dock as the verdicts were read.

He blew kisses to a public gallery full of reporters as he was remanded in custody and led down to the cells.

Judge Alistair McCreath told him: “In light of verdicts, I am remanding him in custody.”

Glitter was cleared of two counts of indecent assault and one count of administering a drug or other thing in order to facilitate sexual intercourse.

He will be sentenced on February 27th at 9.30am.

Backstage invite

Glitter was at the height of his fame when the offences occurred with the victims thinking no one would believe their word over that of a celebrity. He attacked two girls, aged 12 and 13, after inviting them backstage to his dressing room, and isolating them from their mothers.

The 70-year-old’s youngest victim was less than 10 years old when he crept into her bed and tried to rape her in 1975.

The allegations came to light only around 40 years later when Glitter became the first person to be arrested under Operation Yewtree - the investigation launched by the Met in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal.

The glam-rocker had suffered a spectacular fall from grace earlier, when he admitted possessing 4,000 images of child pornography and was jailed for four months in 1999.

In 2002, Glitter was expelled from Cambodia over unspecified allegations, and in March 2006 he was convicted of sexually abusing two girls, aged 10 and 11, in Vietnam.

Indecent assaults

Two indecent assault charges related to a girl, who was aged 13 when the singer invited her to sit on his lap in his dressing room between October 1979 and December 1980.

Wearing a silver sequinned jumpsuit unzipped to the navel, and silver platform boots, he forcefully kissed the youngster and then slid his hand up her skirt.

She had been taken backstage to meet her “idol” as a surprise arranged by her mother’s partner, but after the attack in a club called Baileys in Watford, Glitter told the youngster it was their “secret”.

It was only after his arrest under Operation Yewtree that the woman went to the police.

Glitter, from Marylebone, central London, denied all the allegations.

He claimed there was no way he could have abused the girls in his dressing room because his rigorous wig-maintenance routine required him to return to his suite immediately and clean his hairpiece.

PA