Man faces jail over abuse of two girls

A Fife man who sexually abused two childhood friends more than 30 years ago is facing jail.

Norman Gartshore, 53, preyed on one girl from the age of nine while still a schoolboy and his abuse escalated to having sex with her as she slept when she was a teenager.

Gartshore admitted touching the older girl on three occasions on the back, leg and bottom but denied his behaviour escalated.

The first offender denied three charges of indecency against the girls between 1976 and 1980 and allegedly assaulting the older girl and having sex with her between 1980 and 1985 as she slept and was incapable of giving or withholding consent.

A jury at the High Court in Edinburgh found him guilty of the abuse and assaults at an address in Methil.

Lord Arthurson told him: “You have been convicted of grave and highly disturbing sexual offending against young girls.”

The judge remanded him in custody and told him he would receive “a substantial custodial sentence” for his crimes when he returns next month.

The court heard one victim, now aged 51, sent a message to the other “out of the blue” through Facebook revealing that she saw Gartshore molest her as a child and had suffered abuse by him herself.

The other woman, now 44, replied she was sorry to hear of it and added: “I dealt with this years ago through counselling.”

The younger woman told the court that, as a girl, she went to fetch the other victim to go and play but met Gartshore on a path and he molested her.

The older woman said she had witnessed the abuse.

The court heart that, at the time, Gartshore had already started abusing the older girl and would touch her before simulating sex with her as a child, then having sex with her as a teenager.

The jobless motor engineer told the court: “I was basically discovering how things work.”

He said to police he was “a wee bit infatuated” with the older girl when younger and found touching her “a sexual turn on”.

He conceded he hurt her and added: “It was a nasty, terrible thing to do.”

Gartshore maintained the victims were lying in their evidence over serious episodes of abuse.

He was placed on the sex offenders register.