Glitter Guilty--Gets Three Years

03/03/2006 12:26 PM, E! Online
Josh Grossberg

Gary Glitter is guilty.

That was the verdict handed down Friday by a Vietnamese court after a one-day trial that determined the faded British glam rocker committed obscene acts with two underage girls, according to wire reports.

Condemning his "disgusting and sick" behavior, the judge sentenced the 61-year-old entertainer, whose real name is Paul Gadd, to three years in prison, followed by deportation back to Britain once his term is done.

"Caring for children is to care for our future...but Gary Glitter's acts went against this," Judge Hoang Thanh Tung told the court after the verdict was read. "He sexually abused and committed obscene acts with children many times in a disgusting and sick manner."

The judge cited graphic testimony given by the two minors, ages 11 and 12, in which they told the court Glitter had fondled and abused them on numerous occasions at his residence and nearby hotels. The girls also claimed Glitter showered with them.

Upon hearing his fate, the "Do You Wanna Touch" singer, who was dressed in black clothes and wore a red bandana, offered little in the way of an immediate reaction. However upon leaving the courtroom, he caused a commotion by claiming British tabloids were out to railroad him.

"I haven't done anything. I'm innocent. It's a conspiracy by you know who," Glitter shouted as he was escorted through a throng of reporters and court observers and out of the building.

It was a 180 from Thursday, when Glitter flashed the victory sign to reporters on his way into court.

In addition to prison time, the former hit-maker will have to pay $320 in restitution to each girls' family along with court costs.

Things could have been much worse. Tung decided against giving Glitter the maximum term of seven years in the slammer, opting to go easier and hand him the minimum three years because the musician paid the victims' families $2,000 each back in December. And had Glitter been charged with the more serious crime of child rape, he could have faced death by firing squad if convicted.

Glitter, who has claimed he was only tutoring the girls in English and allowed them to sleep in his bed because they were supposedly afraid of ghosts, has 15 days to appeal his sentence. According to his attorney, the flamboyant performer, best known for the sports-friendly anthem "Rock and Roll Part 2," will be eligible parole once he serves one-third of his term.

This isn't the first time he's been on the business end of a judge's sentence. In 1999, Glitter served a two-month jail term in his native England and was placed on a child sex-offender list after pleading guilty to 54 counts of possessing kiddie porn. He later turned up in Cambodia, but was expelled from the country after child-welfare activists petitioned the government. He eventually settled in Vietnam.