An “arrogant” GP who used his standing in the community as a cover to carry out sexual assaults on patients has been handed a 12-year jail sentence.

Jaswant Rathore was convicted following a seven-week trial after committing a string of sex attacks on four patients, including women who had complained of vomiting and hay fever.

The 60-year-old GP, who was the primary care lead for the Dudley clinical commissioning group, denied touching eight women inappropriately on different occasions between late 2008 and the summer of 2015.

Dudley-based doctor Jaswant Rathore, who was convicted of ten sexual offences (West Midlands Police)

But jurors found the former hospital house officer guilty on Wednesday of attacking four young women, while acquitting him of eight assaults on a further four patients.

Jailing Rathore, Judge Michael Challinor accepted that the married father-of-five’s professional and personal life was a “complete shipwreck” after his conviction for ten sexual assaults committed over a period of two-and-a-half years.

The judge said: “Many witnesses in the trial spoke highly of your professionalism, diligence, expertise and amiability.

“These qualities made you for many of the your patients,the ‘go-to’ doctor in the area.

“You used your standing within the community as a cloak behind which you could carry out sexual assaults on your patients for your personal gratification.

“By your actions you violated the faith they had in you to carry out legitimate medical procedures.”

The judge added: “You deliberately avoided offering chaperones, giving little or no explanation for what you were doing, and failed to make adequate notes in order to hide your offending.

“Some of your behaviour demonstrated a breathtaking degree of arrogance – you no doubt hoping your standing in the medical community would enable you to talk your way out of any difficulty.”

The offences, some involving supposed “massage” of patients, were described by the judge as a shocking breach of trust.

“That trust is eroded by people like you,” the judge told Rathore.

As well as being instructed to register as a sex offender for life, Rathore, of Wall Heath, West Midlands, was made the subject of a 15-year sexual harm prevention order.

The doctor, who practised in the Dudley area, reacted to his sentence by forming his right hand into a fist, gesturing towards his heart and then waving to family members in the public gallery.