Peterborough priest Dennis Finbow jailed for child sexual abuse

Dennis Finbow described the allegations "as nonsense and a fabrication" in police interview

A 74-year-old Catholic priest has been jailed for abusing a young girl in the 1980s despite trying to dismiss the claims as "nonsense".

Dennis Finbow was found guilty of three counts of indecent assault against a girl aged between 10 and 13 while he worked in Dogsthorpe in Peterborough.

Judge Philip Grey told him he had been "unmasked for what you really were".

Finbow, of Bealings Road, Martlesham, near Ipswich, was sentenced to six and a half years in prison.

The Diocese of East Anglia said Finbow, who had also served in St Neots in Cambridgeshire, had retired and not been in active ministry since 2001.

His trial at Cambridge Crown Court was told the defendant had touched the girl while she was in bed.

Prosecutor Nicholas Bleaney said when he was voluntarily interviewed, the defendant described the allegations "as nonsense and a fabrication".

'Psychological harm'

In an impact statement read to the court, the victim said Finbow was a cigar-smoking "larger than life" character who had a "secret life" as a paedophile.

She said she now saw "every man I meet as a potential abuser".

Judge Grey said the offence was "the clearest abuse of trust" and told Finbow: "Your actions... have caused significant lifelong psychological harm."

He said that Finbow had targeted a "particularly vulnerable victim" and that it was "particularly heinous" he took advantage of his position.

The judge heard Finbow had prostate cancer and acknowledged the defendant's "significant ill-health".

Finbow was told he would be on the sex offenders' register for life.

At the time he was convicted, the Right Reverend Peter Collins, Bishop of East Anglia, said he would be "seeking urgent legal advice" about removing Finbow's clerical status and rights.