Former Durham University director jailed for sexually assaulting two women as they slept

Andrew Harston, 39, denied the four charges and claimed the sex was consensual. However, during a hearing at Teesside Crown Court he was found guilty of all four charges.

Ian Lowther, from the Crown Prosecution Service, described Hartley as a "sexual predator".

Harston of Shiell Heights, Aykley Heads, Durham, was yesterday (March 12) sentenced to 14 years in prison and made subject to an indefinite sexual harm prevention order.

During the sentencing hearing, also at Teesside Crown Court, Mr Lowther said: "In both cases, the victims awoke to the terrifying experience of finding Harston in the process of carrying out sexual assaults upon them.

“Throughout the course of this trial, Andrew Harston has tried to minimise his responsibility for these attacks, falsely claiming that any sexual activity with his victims was entirely consensual."

He added: “Neither victims possessed the capacity to give informed consent to sexual activity at the time he carried out these attacks.

“There was no way that Harston could have reasonably believed that they had".