A BABYSITTER found guilty of molesting two young boys has been jailed for eight years.

Former delivery driver Martin Donoghue offered one lad alcohol and pornography before doing inappropriate acts and sexually abusing him, Bristol Crown Court heard.

He then moved on to a second, younger boy and began to similarly "groom" him.

Donoghue, 35, of Almond Way, Downend, denied abusing one teenaged lad and the other lad when he was aged around eight. Neither can be named for legal reasons.

A jury convicted him of six charges of indecent assault on a male and three charges of indecency with a child.

Judge Michael Longman told him he would serve half the sentence in prison, and on his release would be disqualified from working with children.

A former workmate of Donoghue told the Evening Post: "It was a very good sentence but a shame he will only serve half for what he's done. When I worked with him he was very strong-minded and a bit of a bully. He could be very intimidating in the way he talked to you.

"He was engaged to be married until all this kicked off. He told his fiancée and she turned round and dropped him."

Judge Longman summed up how Donoghue encouraged the older lad to visit his home, where he sexually abused him over the course of two years.

He said: "After you finished with him you turned your attention to (the other boy). You began to groom him and you befriended him. The two charges of indecency against him are serious but less so than in relation to the other."

Virginia Cornwall, defending, conceded her client had been convicted of frequently abusing one of the lads over a period of time when he was still relatively young himself.

She said: "There is no suggestion he has moved on to any further abuse of anyone else.

"He has been assessed to be a low risk of committing a sexual offence."

Miss Cornwall said her client had led an "otherwise exemplary life" and had always worked until recently.

She said: "The impact of custody will have a profound effect on him."