A convicted rapist sexually assaulted a five-year-old girl on a train in front of her mother while travelling home from prison.

Darren Rothwell, 42, committed the attack just hours after being released from HMP Forest Bank, in Salford, where he had been serving a sentence for harassment and assault.

He boarded a train at Manchester Victoria on the morning of 18 April and intimidated two women travelling with their young children as he swore aggressively at them while drinking from a bottle of brandy and bragging about being released from prison, British Transport Police (BTP) said.

He added that he was on his way to see an ex-partner who had a restraining order against him, and that he would be back in prison within two days.

After making a series of uncomfortable comments to the two women, Rothwell asked the five-year-old girl, one of their daughters, to take her top off and give it to him.

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One of the women challenged him on his behaviour, but he went on to try and kiss them both.

Rothwell was overheard telling the women to Google his alias “Darren Noonan”, which would have revealed online news coverage of his 2009 conviction for rape, sexual activity with a child and child abduction, British Transport Police (BTP) said.

As the train approached Wigan, Rothwell asked the five-year-old daughter of one of the women for a hug.

He then went to pick the child up before he sexually assaulted her in view of her horrified mother, said BTP.

The alarm was raised and Rothwell was quickly identified by officers.

Rothwell, of Scholes, Wigan, was jailed at Bolton Crown Court for 26 months on Friday after he pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to sexual assault.

DC Ian Grice, of BTP, said: “Rothwell clearly had absolutely no desire to rehabilitate himself after prison but to sexually assault a five-year-old child before he’d even made it home is beyond reprehensible.

“He is clearly an exceptionally dangerous individual and I am relieved, as I’m sure his victim’s family will be, to see him back behind bars.

“I can’t imagine how traumatic this must have been for them and I hope they are now able to begin to put this terrible incident behind them.”