Former X Factor singer Danny Tetley has been sentenced to nine years in prison.
Last month, he pleaded guilty to five charges of sexual exploitation of a child, after being accused of offering to pay five boys between the ages of 15 and 16 to send him sexually explicit images.
On Friday, he appeared in Bradford Crown Court to receive his sentence, where a judge ruled he should spend nine years in prison.
After completing his sentence, Tetley will then be closely monitored on licence for a further eight years as part of a 17-year extended sentence, the Telegraph And Argus has reported.
The messages in question were sent between October 2018 – a month after Tetley first appeared on The X Factor – and August 2019.
Accusing Tetley of “exploiting” the celebrity status he’d earned as a contestant on X Factor, Judge Jonathan Durham Hall QC also told him he had “abused [his] status to satisfy [his] perverted sexual needs”.
He said: “This has been most distressing for the victims. The press are here in force for the extent of gravity of the case, the number of child victims. Your celebrity is now gone, tarnished and destroyed.”
Tetley had previously pleaded not guilty to making indecent images of children and perverting the course of justice, with prosecutor Michael Smith telling the court last month that Tetley would not stand trial on the other outstanding allegations.
The singer reached the semi-final of The X Factor in 2018, where he was mentored by Robbie Williams’ wife Ayda Field, having previously worked as a professional singer in Benidorm.
He also tried out for the now-defunct ITV talent show Pop Idol back in 2001.