Glitter admitted to hospital
2008-01-21 15:56
Hanoi - Former glam-rock star Gary Glitter, currently serving a prison term in Vietnam for child molestation, is being treated for heart problems in a local hospital, Vietnamese officials confirmed on Monday.
"Glitter was admitted to our hospital with acute diarrhoea," said Nguyen Huu Quan, the director of the hospital in Binh Thuan province, near the prison where the 63-year-old British singer is serving out his sentence. "While we were treating him, we found out that he also has a cardiovascular disorder."
Glitter was initially admitted to the hospital on January 4, according to a hospital official.
Quan said Glitter was under police guard in his hospital room, and that it was unclear when he would be healthy enough to release.
But the director of the prison where Glitter has been held said he expected the singer to return to jail soon.
Glitter was convicted in 2006 of molesting two Vietnamese girls, ages 12 and 13, while they visited his rented home in the seaside resort town of Vung Tau, 50 kilometres east of Ho Chi Minh City.
The Vietnamese girls, who were 11 at the time of the crime, said that Glitter lured them into taking baths with him and that he fondled and licked them.
Glitter's sentence of two years and eight months will end in August.
'Conviction orchestrated by the media'
The singer, whose real name is Paul Francis Gadd, made his name with such 1970s hits as Rock and Roll (Part 2) and Do You Wanna Touch.
He has denied he is a paedophile and said his conviction was orchestrated by the media.
Once known for his bouffant wigs and outrageous stage persona, the singer began his long fall from grace with a 1999 child pornography conviction in Britain after a computer repairman discovered a large collection of photos on his laptop computer.
After serving several months in prison, he left Britain and lived in both Cuba and Cambodia before he was forced to leave both countries under a cloud of media suspicion and child-sex rumours.
There has been speculation that Glitter might be released as part of the annual prisoner amnesty preceding Tet, the Vietnamese New Year, in early February.
"We are working on a list of prisoners who will have their sentences reduced on the occasion of the Tet holidays," said Tran Huu Thong, director of the Thu Duc Detention Centre, where Glitter had been jailed. "I am not sure whether he is on the list or not." - dpa
- SAPA