Police called to disturbance at Gary Glitter bail hostel after paedophile freed from prison
Police have been called to a disturbance at the bail hostel where paedophile Gary Glitter is staying after his release from prison.
A crowd of people are understood to have gathered outside the property in Hampshire yesterday after the disgraced 79-year-old former pop star was released from prison the day before, having served half his 16-year sentence for sexually abusing three schoolgirls.
Glitter, whose real name is Paul Gadd, left HMP The Verne – a low security category C jail in Portland, Dorset – after eight years behind bars.
Protesters outside the bail hostel, which is in a residential area, reportedly demanded he be removed from their neighbourhood, with one man attempting to scale a fence.
The protest came as Richard Scorer, head of the abuse law team at Slater and Gordon – which represents one of Glitter’s victims – said his release was “particularly distressing and traumatic” for those he attacked.
“The early release devalues her suffering and that of his other victims,” he added.
A Hampshire police spokesperson said last night: “Police were called at 3.32pm today to reports of a public order incident. Officers attended the scene and the situation was resolved.
“No arrests were made.”
Glitter, pictured on stage in December 1997…
… and again in November 1999
Disgraced singer’s sex crimes
Glitter, who had a string of chart hits in the 1970s, was convicted and jailed in 2015 for the historic sex attacks.
He had attacked two girls, aged 12 and 13, after inviting them backstage to his dressing room and isolating them from their mothers.
The singer crept into the bed of his third victim, a girl aged under 10 at the time, in an attempt to rape her in 1975.
The allegations came to light nearly 40 years later, when Glitter became the first person to be arrested under Operation Yewtree – the investigation launched in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal.
Glitter’s fall from grace had happened years earlier after he admitted possessing around 4,000 child pornography images and was jailed for four months in 1999.
In 2002, he was expelled from Cambodia amid reports of sex crime allegations, and in March 2006 was convicted of sexually abusing two girls, aged 10 and 11, in Vietnam and spent two-and-a-half years in prison.
His release from HMP The Verne came automatically halfway through a fixed-term determinate sentence, and he will now be subject to licence conditions.
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “Sex offenders like Paul Gadd are closely monitored by the police and Probation Service and face some of the strictest licence conditions, including being fitted with a GPS tag.
“If the offender breaches these conditions at any point, they can go back behind bars.”
Angelina Jolie says although she appreciates being an artist, she would prefer for her legacy to be “a good mother” and to be known for her “belief in equality and human rights”.
The Oscar-winning actress stars as Maria Callas in the new Pablo Larrain film about the opera singer’s life.
Pic: StudioCanal
She has called Maria “the hardest” and “most challenging” role she has had in her career and put months of preparation into immersing herself into the world of opera.
Jolie, who recently reached a divorce settlement with actor Brad Pitt, told Sky News: “To be very candid, it was the therapy I didn’t realise I needed. I had no idea how much I was holding in and not letting out.
“So, the challenge wasn’t the technical [side of opera], it was an emotional experience to find my voice, to be in my body, to express. You have to give every single part of yourself.”
The biopic combines the voice of the Maleficent actress with recordings of Maria Callas.
Jolie believes it “would be a crime to not have [Callas’] voice through this because, in many ways, she is very present in this film”.
Who was Maria Callas?
Born in New York in 1923, Maria Callas was the daughter of Greek immigrants who moved back to Athens at the age of 13 with her mother and sister.
After enrolling at the Athens Conservatory, she made her professional debut at 17 and went on to become one of the most famous faces of opera, travelling around the world and performing at Covent Garden in London, The Met in New York and La Scala in Milan.
Callas’s final operatic performance took place at Covent Garden in 1965 when she was 41 but she continued to work conducting master classes at Juilliard School, doing concert tours and starring in the 1969 film Medea.
Written by Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight, Maria focuses on the artist’s final years in the 1970s when she moved to Paris and disappeared from public view.
She died on 16 September 1977 at the age of 53.
Pic: StudioCanal
Jolie on changing motivations as an actor
Maria follows the life of an artist fully consumed by the art she creates and even remarks that “happiness never developed a beautiful melody”.
Reflecting on her own life in the spotlight, Jolie said she noticed her own career motivations change over the years.
“There’s this kind of study of being human that we do when we create, and we communicate with an audience because our work is not in isolation – it’s a connection.
“I think when I was younger, I had different questions about being human and different feelings and now as I’ve gotten older, I understand some things and now I have different questions.
“It’s a matter of life, right? And so maybe that’s interesting that this now is a character really contemplating death and really contemplating the toll of certain things in life that I, of course, couldn’t have understood in my 20s”.
Jolie at the New York Film Festival in September with three of her children (L-R) Pax, Zahara and Maddox. Pic: AP
A family affair
Two of Jolie’s children, Maddox and Pax, took on production assistant roles during the filming of Maria and witnessed their mother perform opera for the first time in public.
She says the film allowed them to create new experiences together and for her children to see her approach to playing a difficult role.
“Everyone in my home, we all give each other space to be who we are and we’re all different.
“I’m the mom, but I’m also an artist and a person and so my family has been very kind and gives me their understanding. They make fun of me, and they support me and just as you’d hope it would be.”
She adds: “When you play somebody who is dealing with so much pain, it’s very important to come home to some kindness.”
Maria is in cinemas now.
Tom Holland’s dad has confirmed his son’s engagement to Zendaya – revealing how the 28-year-old meticulously planned the proposal.
Zendaya, also 28, sparked engagement rumours when she attended last Sunday’s Golden Globes wearing a sparkling diamond on her ring finger.
Neither star has publicly addressed the rumours but Tom’s comedian father, Dominic Holland, has now confirmed the pair are set to wed.
He wrote in a post on his Patreon account: “Tom, as you know by now was very incredibly well prepared. He had purchased a ring.
“He had spoken with her father and gained permission to propose to his daughter.”
“Tom had everything planned out… When, where, how, what to say, what to wear,” he added.
Zendaya arrived at the Golden Globes with a noticeable piece of new jewellery. Pic: Invision/AP
Dominic also noted that while most men worry about being able to afford an engagement ring, he suspects his actor son was “more concerned with the stone, its size and clarity, its housing, which jeweller”.
Tom and Zendaya met on the set of Spider-Man: Homecoming in 2016, when they played the titular hero and his love interest MJ, respectively. Their romance was confirmed in 2021.
In his post, Tom’s father admitted fears over whether being in the spotlight could put a strain on the couple’s relationship.
He wrote: “I do fret that their combined stardom will amplify their spotlight and the commensurate demands on them and yet they continually confound me by handling everything with aplomb.”
“And even though show business is a messy place for relationships and particularly so for famous couples as they crash and burn in public and are too numerous to mention […] yet somehow right at the same time, I am completely confident they will make a successful union.”
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Paris Hilton’s home destroyed in fires
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Zendaya rose to fame after landing a role in Disney sitcom Shake It Up, and became a household name after starring in Euphoria.
Holland – who has starred in three Spider-Man films opposite his now-fiancée – made his stage debut in Billy Elliot the Musical in 2008.
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