Former "vicar to the stars" cleared of sexual assaults

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Guy Bennett
Image caption,

Mr Bennett is accused of touching the girls while working as a rector in Oxted

A retired "vicar to the stars" has been cleared of committing a string of sexual assaults against young girls.

Guy Bennett, 84, was accused of touching the girls while Rector of St Mary's parish church in Oxted, Surrey, from the mid 1970s to early 1990s.

Mr Bennett, of Lewes Road, East Grinstead, West Sussex, denied the attacks, said to have been on Sunday school outings or while teaching.

The jury at Guildford Crown Court acquitted him in less than four hours.

The trial lasted 11 days. Mr Bennett was found not guilty of all 24 counts of indecent assault, and one count of outraging public decency.

He was dubbed "vicar to the stars" while working as chaplain at the London Palladium between 1972 and 1998.

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