Ex-BBC DJ admits to 21 counts of child sex abuse

A former BBC DJ and radio presenter in the UK, Chris Denning, has admitted to abusing 11 children, some as young as eight, with one victim being abused at Jimmy Savile’s house.

Denning, 75, will be sentenced on 6 October, but is already in jail serving a 13-year sentence for sexual assaults on 24 different victims aged 9 - 16 carried out between the 1960s and 1980s.

Four of Denning's victims were in court to see him plead guilty.

He will be sentenced at London’s Southwark Crown Court by the same judge who jailed him for his most recent offences.

The latest 21 offences were discovered as part of a police investigation into a youth disco, which includes indecent assault of men and boys and inciting boys under 16 and 14 to commit acts of gross indecency. He denied three other offences.

He was part of the original crew that launched BBC Radio 1 in 1967, but left two years later. His career ended after he was first convicted of sex offences in 1974. 

Prosecutor Jonathan Polnay said Denning had a “very long record of offences against young boys”.

Denning was a friend of Jimmy Savile’s, and the court heard he had abused one of his victims at Savile’s home, using “the allure of the record industry and celebrity” to attract his young victims, British tabloid The Sun reported.

In recent years, British state-run BBC has been rocked by revelations surrounding its former employees being sexual predators. The spillover happened after the death of ex-BBC TV host and popular personality, Jimmy Savile, in 2011 who was found to be a sexual predator.

Several high-profile figures have been arrested in connection with the multiple investigations into the abuse scandal surrounding the BBC’s ex-presenter.

In January 2013, a report by the police and the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children branded Savile as one of the UK’s most prolific known sexual predators, who used his celebrity status to “hide in plain sight.”

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