A sweetshop owner raped and sexually assaulted two young girls he groomed at his seaside premises.

He indecently assaulted one girl at his shop on the pier at Teignmouth, and raped the other in a stock room at his video shop in the seaside resort.

The offences happened in the 1980s and the victims carried the burden of them for decades before the truth came out.

On Monday, Harry Yeomans, 75, admitted rape and six other sex offences. He was jailed for seven-and-a-half years.

His victims – now aged 42 and 37 – were saved from giving evidence when Yeomans admitted his guilt just as his trial was to start.

Exeter Crown Court heard Yeomans married a Philippino woman and they had two sons.

He ran a sweetshop in Regent Street, Teignmouth, with a storeroom and a bucket and spade shop on the town's pier, as well as other shops in the south Devon area.

Prosecutor David Sapiecha said the pier shop was 'a magnet for children nearby' and the victims of his sexual abuse were friends with his young sons and would also help out at his shops.

Yeomans was in his 40s when he sexually assaulted one of the girls, aged just 11, in the back of his shop.

The victim said she was 'terrified' that customers would come into the shop and, on occasions they did, but could not see what was going on.

Mr Sapiecha said: 'It made her feel dirty. It was something that she did not want. It stopped when she was 12.'

Years later she told her mother what had happened, but it was not until 2009 that she told the police formally because she felt guilty and to blame for what happened.

Yeomans raped and sexually assaulted the second girl in the upstairs stock room of his shop and gave her money.

In police interviews he said the girls had made up the stories and said his boys were popular because 'daddy owned a sweet shop'.

Defence barrister Mary McCarthy said in mitigation that Yeomans is 75, in poor health and has no previous convictions and not been in trouble since the historic abuse.

Yeomans admitted rape, five indecent assaults and indecency with a child, the charges spanning 1982 to 1985 when the girls were aged 11 to 13.

Judge Graham Cottle said he groomed both girls he befriended through his sweetshop.

He said: 'These two women have had their lives seriously blighted by what you did to them when they were young girls.

'They have carried the memory of it; they have felt guilt and it has affected their ability to form relationships in their adult lives.'

The judge said Yeomans will have to serve five years before he is released from jail and ordered him to sign on the Sex Offenders' Register for life.