A former BBC presenter who previously admitted to a series of sexual assaults on teenage girls has been jailed again. Peter Rowell, 67, was charged with indecent assault on girls under the age of 16 and jailed for six years in 2012. Rowell was found with more than 400 images and admitted six counts of making an indecent photograph of a child. He was ordered to sign the sex offender register at Bristol Crown Court.
Rowell, who was a regular on BBC Radio Bristol and BBC Somerset, has now been locked up again for 29 weeks after pleading guilty to two counts of breaching sex offender notification requirements. Newport Magistrates' Court heard how Rowell spent more than 12 hours at a property with a child under 18 with or without an adult. He also failed to inform the police that he had travelled 30 from his home in Abergavenny, Monmouthshire to stay at another address.
The court heard that Rowell has a "flagrant disregard for court orders".
It comes more than a decade after Rowell confessed to taking indecent images of children and pleaded guilty to 12 counts of indecent assault against five women.
The father-of-one, from Wickwar, South Gloucestershire, targeted the girls between 1989 and the early 1990s, when they were under 16.
Rowell abused his position as a "minor celebrity", inviting the girls to his studio after they contacted him to find out more about his job. Rowell triggered a police hunt after failing to turn up to present his regular afternoon programme in March 2011.
The broadcaster, who also worked as a news bulletin reader for ITV West for more than 10 years, was found in Keswick, Cumbria, and arrested.
During his sentencing in 2012, Judge David Ticehurst said: "You had a life and lifestyle that would have been the envy of many - an apparently successful career in a glamorous and glittering world.
"Behind that public image you were a man that hid a dark secret. You were attracted to young girls, sexually abusing and exploiting for your own gratification.
"You were someone prepared to use the world of showbiz to attract young girls to you to abuse them. It is not a case of you involving yourself with a star-struck teenager on an isolated occasion and succumbing to temptation but a series of offences involving five separate girls over a period of five years."
He added: "These girls made contact with you as a minor celebrity. You invited them to visit your studio and they believed they were getting an insight into the media world. In truth it was enabling you to sexually abuse them."
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