A PERVERT who groped a performer on stage during an act at a holiday park in the Clacton area has been spared jail.

Michael Galbraith, 32, was handed a community order at Chelmsford Crown Court after being convicted of three offences of sexual assault in the autumn of 2017.

The court was told the victim was so shaken she has given up the work she loved.

Sentencing Galbraith, who denied sexual assault, Judge Emma Peters said she did not know whether his use of cocaine or alcohol had contributed to his high spirits on the night.

She said: “You wanted to show off or to give yourself a bit of a laugh for your own benefit.

“It’s important you have the opportunity to address some of your attitudes which caused you to behave in that way that night. This lady has been affected.

“You may seek to still deny the offences or minimise it but from her perspective, standing on that stage and being subjected to your assaults, it’s had a significant impact upon her but I still think it’s right to start with a community sentence.”

The victim told a jury during the hearing of her humiliation and how she suffered constant jeers, cat calls and whistles before and during a show at a holiday park.

Galbraith, of Cann Hall Road, Leytonstone, denied three offences of sexual assault committed when he was on stage which involved licking her breasts, pulling up her dress and ripping her tights.

Judge Peters said Galbraith had shown a disrespectful attitude towards women and added his victim had been “humiliated”.

She imposed a 12-month community order with 60 days rehabilitation activity requirement to address Galbraith’s cocaine and alcohol misuse and his attitudes.

She also ordered the unemployed father-of-three to pay £1,000 costs and to sign the Sex Offenders’ Register for five years.

During the trial, the victim told the jury she was being jeered at constantly during the show.

She claimed Galbraith left the stage when she asked, but towards the end he came back on stage and hugged her, breaking an expensive piece of equipment she was holding.

She said: “He came up to try and hug me to say that he was sorry, that he was disrupting everything.”