Suspended sentence for Dave Lee Travis

Dave Lee Travis walked free from court today after being found guilty of groping a young researcher behind the scenes at The Mrs Merton Show.

The former Top Of The Pops presenter was sentenced to three months in prison suspended for two years by Judge Anthony Leonard QC.

London’s Southwark Crown Court heard Travis got a “weird sexual thrill” when he indecently assaulted the woman, who is now a successful TV personality, in 1995.

The DJ cornered the woman in the corridor of a BBC television studio where she was smoking and commented on her “poor little lungs” before squeezing her breasts for 10 to 15 seconds.

Sentencing 69-year-old Travis, Judge Leonard said: “It was an intentional and unpleasant sexual assault.

“You took advantage of a young woman in a vulnerable position whose job it was to look after you that day.”

Grey-haired Travis glanced at the floor and replied “Thank you, your honour” after the judge passed sentence.

Marianne, Travis's wife of more than 40 years, hugged a friend in the public gallery after the judge delivered his sentence.

Addressing Travis, Judge Leonard said the DJ’s offence was of a “different order” to other high profile convictions under Operation Yewtree.

He said: “Whilst the commission of any indecent assault is serious and reprehensible, the scale and nature of the offences of which Stuart Hall and other defendants who have been successfully prosecuted under Operation Yewtree and have been sentenced are of a different order of magnitude to the single offence of which you have been convicted.”

Travis later said he was “mortified” and “really disappointed” over his conviction but again criticised his prosecution.