What did Gary Glitter do? Paedophile former pop star recalled to prison
Disgraced former pop star Gary Glitter has been recalled to prison after breaching his licence conditions.
The Probation Service said the 78-year-old paedophile had been returned to custody less than six weeks after being released.
At the beginning of February, Glitter, whose real name is Paul Gadd, was released from prison after eight years behind bars.
Why is Gary Glitter back in prison?
In February, Glitter was automatically released from HMP The Verne, a low-security category C jail in Portland, Dorset.
He had spent eight years in prison, having served half of his 16-year fixed-term determinate sentence.
On Monday, the Probation Service said Glitter was recalled to jail following a breach of his licence conditions.
Watch: Gary Glitter freed from prison after serving half of 16-year sentence
Glitter was subject to licence conditions once in the community, including being closely monitored by the police and Probation Service and fitted with a GPS tag.
A Probation Service spokesperson said on Monday: “Protecting the public is our number one priority. That’s why we set tough licence conditions and when offenders breach them, we don’t hesitate to return them to custody.”
What was Gary Glitter convicted of?
In 2015, Glitter was jailed for sexually abusing three schoolgirls.
He was convicted of attempted rape, four counts of indecent assault and one of having sex with a girl under 13.
How did Gary Glitter breach his licence conditions?
The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) did not give details of the breach, but The Sun reported he was caught trying to access the dark web.
Footage last week showed the former singer staring at a mobile phone while reportedly in his bail hostel.
The MoJ had said on his release that he would face “some of the strictest licence conditions” and that if he flouted them at any point he could go back behind bars.
Following his relocation to the hostel, protesters gathered outside the accommodation reportedly shouting demands for him to be removed from their neighbourhood.
Richard Scorer, head of abuse law at Slater and Gordon, which represents one of Glitter’s victims, said his release was “particularly distressing and traumatic” for those he attacked.
How was Gary Glitter caught?
The sex offender was at the height of his fame when he preyed on his victims, who thought no one would believe their claims because of his celebrity status.
He attacked two girls, aged 12 and 13, after inviting them backstage to his dressing room and isolating them from their mothers.
Read more: Gary Glitter will not receive royalties for Joker soundtrack
His third victim was less than 10 years old when he crept into her bed and tried to rape her in 1975.
The allegations only came to light nearly 40 years later when Glitter became the first person to be arrested under Operation Yewtree – the investigation launched by the Metropolitan Police in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal.
His fall from grace occurred years earlier after he admitted possessing 4,000 child pornography images and was jailed for four months in 1999.
In 2002, he was expelled from Cambodia amid reports of sex crime allegations, and in March 2006 he was convicted of sexually abusing two girls, aged 10 and 11, in Vietnam and spent two-and-a-half years in jail.
Glitter is 78 years old. He was born Paul Gadd in Banbury, Oxfordshire, on 8 May 1944.
He had a string of chart hits in the 1970s.
