Ayling fails to regain freedom

Ayling was jailed for four years for molesting 10 female patients

Disgraced former GP Clifford Ayling who was on parole for only three weeks before breaching a condition of his licence has failed to regain his freedom.

Ayling, 72, who worked in Folkestone, Kent, was jailed for four years in December 2000 on 13 counts of indecent assault on women patients between 1991 and 1998.

He was released on licence on 18 August this year but was sent back to Brixton Prison on 4 September for disobeying the ban in referring to himself as doctor.

He had used the title in a letter to the registrar of the Bankruptcy Court.

'Something sinister'

At the High Court on Friday Ayling applied to be freed saying that it was only a technical breach resulting from a "foolish slip".

But Mr Justice said the Parole Board was fully entitled to recommend his licence be revoked and Home Secretary David Blunkett acted lawfully in revoking it.

He said Ayling was guilty of the "most grievous offences against patients" and using the title could have been viewed as having "something sinister" in it by those concerned with public safety.

The judge aslo said the correct procedure for challenging revocation of parole was to make representations to the Parole Board, which Ayling had not yet done.

Ayling, who was not legally aided, was ordered to pay £300 towards the Home Secretary's legal costs in opposing the case.

His schedule release date is 17 December.

After his conviction, Ayling was struck off the medical register and the General Medical Council's professional conduct committee said his actions constituted "criminal indecency of a particularly wicked kind.".