Sex offender jailed after sexually assaulting two girls

John Andow, 78, “knew exactly what he was doing” when his physical contact with his two child victims turned sexual, Chelmsford Crown Court heard.

The sex offender had denied seven counts of sexual activity with a child, but was convicted of two counts following a trial last month.

Andow, of Normandie Way, Bures, was acquitted of five counts - and he was cleared of a further count of causing a child to watch a sexual act.

At a sentencing hearing yesterday, statements were read which detailed the trauma felt by Andow’s two victims.

One victim said the offence had affected her ability to communicate and her relationships with people.

“It’s affected everything,” she said.

The girl said she suffered from insomnia, adding that since the assault “she can’t bear to be touched”.

The second victim said: “In my head it was chaos.

“I felt completely on my own, noone understood how I felt or what I’d been through.”

John Andow

Judge Timothy Walker said each of the offences involved touching two girls’ under their clothing.

He said: “You would start massaging and progressively move up.

“The massages lasted between ten and 20 minutes.”

Turning to one victim, he said: “You told her not to do anything that she didn’t want to and if she was uncomfortable then she should use a stop word ‘chocolate’.

“You knew exactly what you were doing.”

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He added: “In evidence you accepted that you had massaged both girls and you went as far as accepting the area of their sternums although you denied massaging their breasts.

“Unsurprisingly, you were not believed.”

Roderick Johnson QC, mitigating, described the offences as “short-lived temptation”. He added: “The temptation arose which led Mr Andow to momentarily lose his moral compass which had otherwise been his guide all his life.”

Mr Johnson said the victim impact statements should be “tempered”, with the jury “having rejected most of the allegations made”.

But Judge Walker said Andow had carried out two sexual assaults on vulnerable girls.

He sentenced to 30 months in prison and made him subject of a ten-year sexual harm prevention order prohibiting unsupervised contact with children.