A man who repeatedly raped a young girl and sexually abused another child has been jailed for 18 years.

Stephen Hunt started to abuse the first girl when she was just eight or nine years old. The abuse continued until he started to rape her when she was 14.

The 39-year-old from Chippenham also sexually abused the other girl when she was about seven years old.

Hunt denied the charges but was found guilty by a jury of six men and six women at Swindon Crown Court last month.

He was living in Melksham when the sex offending started in the mid-1990s.

The abuse of the first girl stretched for about a decade, while he molested the other child between the start of 1999 and the end of 2001.

The court heard that as a result of being repeatedly raped the girl had suffered feelings of self-loathing for many years, as she could not bring herself to tell anyone what was happening to her until years later.

Hunt, of Oaklands, Chippenham, was found guilty of seven counts of rape and six of indecent assault.

The jury failed to reach verdicts on three other counts of rape, which were left to lie on file, and he was cleared of an indecent assault.

Marcus Davey, defending, said there was little he could put forward in mitigation as Hunt knew he was facing a lengthy jail term.

He said that his client had no previous convictions.

Mr Davey urged the court not to impose imprisonment for public protection, meaning his client would only be released when the parole board deemed he was safe.

When he is eventually freed, he said, he will be under the close supervision of multi-agency public protection arrangements.

The court heard he will also be made subject to a sexual offences prevention order which will severely restrict his liberty when he is released.

Judge Douglas Field said he felt there was a “significant risk of serious harm to young girls from further specified offences”.

But he said he thought that could be managed by a long period in jail coupled with the sexual offences prevention order.

Jailing him, he said: “I have decided that, bearing in mind the circumstances, I should treat you as dangerous within the meaning of the Criminal Justice Act 2003.

“I have decided the risk you pose to young female children can be met by a long period of imprisonment and a sexual offences prevention order.”

Hunt will have to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life and will be on the barred list, preventing him working with children or vulnerable adults.