A swimming coach from Wiltshire has been jailed for three-and-a-half-years after admitting striking up a sexual relationship with a teenage girl more than 30 years his junior.

Married father-of-three Stephen Hartley, 48, spotted the talent of the girl when she joined his club aged only 11.

But over the years their 'father-daughter' type relationship became closer, Swindon Crown Court was told.

It came to a head when aged 13, the girl began sending Hartley of Hawkeridge Park, Westbury, sexual text messages one of which was seen by his own daughter, leading to the girl being suspended from the swimming club.

This was the perfect chance, said prosecutor Jane Warren, for Hartley to distance himself.

Instead they embarked on a secret relationship, meeting outdoors with the girl initiating sexual activities.

'We got more and more blasi about it and we got more blinded. Then I started to reciprocate,' he told police in interview.

Hartley's wife had suspected an affair, not with the girl, but with her mother because she could not consider the first, the court was told.

When she reached 16 Hartley and the girl had full consensual sex and their affair continued up until his arrest in September last year.

It was revealed after the girl told a church member of the affair in a counselling session. Detectives and the girl's family were then alerted.

FOR more Bristol, Somerset, Gloucestershire, Dorset and Wiltshire news, order a regular copy of the Sunday Independent. FIRST. BEST. EVERY SUNDAY...