A SEX attacker almost fainted and had to be supported by two security officers in the dock at Cardiff crown court when he was jailed for three years.
Jonathan Terrell, 44, a man with no previous convictions, of Clarendon Close, Chepstow, had been found guilty of four charges of indecently assaulting a girl under 16.
Once he sent the girl text messages saying he loved her and wished he could go out with her.
Judge David Morris said Terrell committed serious offences in an attempt to “slake his sexual lust.”
For such abuse, he said, custody was the only form of punishment.
He said Terrell had been a man with an otherwise law-abiding reputation, very well thought of by the community.
He was ordered on release to register as a sex offender for life and disqualified from working with children for life.
Prosecutor John Ryan said matters came to light in March 2004 when the girl said she had been sexually abused by Terrell, but she decided to make no formal complaint.
Terrell voluntarily went to the police and denied any inappropriate behaviour.
But in March last year she felt able to make a full complaint.
Mr Ryan said Terrell indecently assaulted the girl in a house and also a warehouse in Sedbury.
Mr Ryan said the girl was too scared to say anything for fear of his reaction.
“When he stopped he told her not to tell anyone because he would get into trouble.”
In a letter to the court the girl, now aged over 18, said she had been receiving counselling, suffered from insomnia, vomited after meals and had undergone dramatic weight loss.
Terrell’s counsel, Carl Williams, said there were no serious aggravating features in the case.
“There was no force, no violence, no explicit sex, no plying with drink or drugs. Prison would not serve any purpose” he said.
