"THERE can be few more shocking breaches of trust than that which exists between a doctor and his patients”, the judge told disgraced Dudley GP Jaswant Rathore as he jailed him today (Thursday) for carrying out sex attacks on patients.

The once highly-respected family doctor was today starting a 12-year prison sentence after being found guilty yesterday on ten charges of sexual assault on four patients following a seven-week trial at Wolverhampton Crown Court.

Judge Michael Challinor said it was clear Rathore, aegd 60, had worked hard to build up his Castle Meadows Surgery in Dudley.

He said: "Many witnesses have spoken highly of your professionalism, diligence, expertise and amiability. These qualities and your high reputation and trustworthiness made you the go-to doctor in the area.”

But he said Rathore used his standing in the community as a cloak to hide behind in order to carry out sexual assaults for his own personal gratification and he added: "By your actions you violated the trust they had in you to carry out legitimate medical procedures."

And he continued: "Some of your behaviour demonstrated a breath-taking degree of arrogance with you no doubt hoping your standing in the medical community would enable you to talk your way out of any difficulty.

It was deliberate, planned offending and a series of assaults over a significant period of time which had caused significant harm, said the judge who continued: “Many people visit their doctors and submit to the most intimate examinations because they trust their doctors. That is eroded by people like you.

"There can be few more shocking breaches of trust than that which exists between a doctor and his patients."

The court was told the GP, who qualified in 1985, had touched the victims inappropriately after they went to see him for treatment to complaints including hay fever, back and stomach pain.

He used the treatment as an excuse to touch them, the jury was told, and his actions left them badly shaken and embarrassed.

Rathore, of Ploughmans Walk, Wall Heath, who had been suspended from working with patients since his arrest, now faced being struck off by the General Medical Council.

He must also register as a Sex Offender for the rest of his life and was made the subject of a 15-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order by the judge who told him: "The General Medical Council will see to it that you are not permitted to carry out any medical procedures against women. This was for your sexual gratification and the jury have made that clear by their verdicts."

The jury did clear him on eight further charges (against four other women patients) but the judge said the convictions represented a "complete shipwreck" in the life of the doctor whose family packed the public gallery at the court.

The four victims were also present in court to see Rathore sentenced and as he left the dock to begin his sentence he waved to his wife and daughters.

In his defence - the doctor, a married father-of-five who was previously a clinical lead on Dudley Clinical Commissioning Group, maintained everything he had done was to ease the pain and discomfort suffered by his patients and it was appropriate for the symptoms they described.