Hall cleared of rape but guilty of indecent assault

Agencies

London

Disgraced broadcaster Stuart Hall was yesterday cleared of raping two young girls but convicted of indecently assaulting a girl under 16.

The former BBC presenter, who is already serving a jail sentence for other sex attacks, was cleared of 19 counts of sexual abuse, including 15 counts of rape, against two girls as young as 13, between 1976 and 1981.

But a jury found him guilty of indecently assaulting one of the girls in the late Seventies.

At the beginning of the trial he had admitted another charge of assaulting a girl under 16.

The 84-year-old, who denied the charges, stared straight ahead as the verdicts were read out at Preston Crown Court.

Wearing a dark suit, white shirt and striped tie, he sat impassively in the dock as he was told he will be sentenced next Friday.

The former It’s A Knockout presenter, who was then in his mid-forties, said the sex with the girls was consensual.

Many of the encounters were at BBC television studios in Manchester, where Hall presented the corporation’s regional news programme.

Hall’s barrister Crispin Aylett QC questioned why the girls would continually return to the BBC studios and suggested it was because they enjoyed the “charming” and “charismatic” company of the “larger-than-life” defendant.

Hall is already serving a 30-month jail term after he indecently assaulted 13 different girls, one as young as nine, over a period of nearly 20 years. He was initially given a 15-month prison term, but the court of appeal ruled the sentence was “inadequate” and it was doubled.

He was taken from custody last October and questioned about allegations from the latest complainants, who came forward after his conviction.

Both girls and their families were known to the defendant. Hall chose not to give evidence as his defence team questioned whether the case was “a persecution” rather than a prosecution.

The married father-of-two, from Wilmslow, Cheshire, was stripped of his OBE for broadcasting and charity after his convictions. He was a familiar face and voice in British broadcasting for half a century, and his football summaries made him a cult figure on BBC Radio 5 Live.

Hall mouthed “Thank you” to the jury at the end of the two-week trial as he was led away to the cells to continue serving his sentence for earlier offences.