Dentist Colin Howell has been given a five-and-a-half-year jail term for indecently assaulting five of his female patients while they were under sedation.
The former lay preacher, who is already serving 21 years for murdering his wife and his ex-lover’s husband, pleaded guilty to 12 charges of taking advantage of the sedated women over a period of four years.
He groped and fondled some as he helped them down the stairs of his practice in Ballymoney, Co Antrim while he placed the hand of another on his groin while she lay unconscious on the chair.
A number had asked to been heavily sedated because they had a serious phobia about dental treatments.
Sentencing at Antrim Crown Court, Judge Corine Philpott said he abused his position of trust. “You are an intelligent man and you had the means to stop yourself from doing this,” she told the 52-year-old as he stood before her in the dock.
She noted that some of his victims did not even know what had happened to them. "These injured parties did not know what was going on, they did not know precisely what happened, but you did,” she told him.
Last year the dentist was sentenced to life in prison, with a 21-year minimum term, after confessing to murdering his wife Lesley and Trevor Buchanan, the policeman husband of his then lover Hazel Stewart, in Coleraine in May 1991.
Stewart (48), was also convicted of the double murder, which police believed for 19 years was suicide, after standing trial earlier this year. She is serving an 18-year minimum life term.
