A FORMER diplomat has been sent to prison for three years for prolonged sexual abuse of a girl.

Stanley Wilkinson was told by a judge that he was making the sentences concurrent on the six offences because of health problems suffered by both him and his wife.

The 70-year-old, who joined the Foreign Office in 1954 and retired as a First Secretary in 1988, subjected his victim to a catalogue of abuse from an early age.

The girl told Maidstone Crown Court that Wilkinson, of Lavender Court, Sittingbourne, started groping her and progressed to trying to rape her. She was unable to tell anyone about her ordeal for some years.

He had warned her, she said, to keep quiet, adding: “No-one would believe you, anyway.”

She eventually told a police officer that she had an image in her mind of him being in the Foreign Office and her mother not believing her.

The girl, now aged 18, said the first time anything untoward happened was when she was playing in the garden of his then home in Periwinkle Close, Sittingbourne, when she was aged about six or seven.

Wilkinson, denied two charges of attempted rape, three of indecent assault and one of indecency with a child between July 1992 and July 1998. He was convicted of all charges by a 10-2 majority.

Wilkinson, who married in 1956, denied in evidence that there was any truth whatsoever in the allegations.

He was, in January, cleared of four charges of indecent assault on another girl, now aged 11, between October 22 2000 and January 31 last year.

Rupert Bowers, defending, said Wilkinson had led an active and useful life. He now took care of his wife, who suffered from a number of ailments.

“She is able to get around the house with a walking stick but unable to leave the house unattended,” he said.

“A custodial sentence on this defendant will plainly effect her. He urges me to ask you to consider a suspended sentence, although I accept the seriousness of the offences.”

Mr Bowers said Wilkinson posed little risk at his age. Prison, he said, would be devastating. He was concerned for his wife’s health.

But Judge Michael Neligan said the offences were serious. “I take into account your previous good character, age and state of your wife’s health and, indeed, your health,” he said.

Wilkinson will remain on the sex offenders’ register for life. He was also banned from coming into contact with children under 16.