People living on an affluent housing estate spoke of their horror yesterday after learning that Lotto rapist Iorworth Hoare had moved in as a neighbour.

Some said he had invited them to his home for Christmas drinks. Others believed Hoare was a married barrister with children - not a sex offender once dubbed a danger to all women.

He used his £7m fortune to gazump a would-be buyer who thought he had secured the £700,000, six-bedroom mansion on the exclusive Darras Hall estate, in Ponteland, Northumberland - home to Premiership footballers.

Hoare keeps a police officer's helmet in a study, surrounded by cuddly toys. His two immediate neighbours are terrified and refuse to leave their children at home alone.

Near neighbours include football legends Alan Shearer, Peter Beardsley and Terry McDermott. Current Newcastle stars Kieron Dyer and Scott Parker are also residents.

The estate of about 2,500 homes has the largest number of top-earning professionals outside the South-East.

The security-conscious residents once voted in favour of turning their estate into a Beverly Hills-style gated community by shutting off all five entrances to the public at night.

Hoare lives around the corner from Shearer's home, where the footballer lives with wife Lainya, two daughters and son.

Mother-of-two Claire Redhead, 39, a school classroom supervisor, said her daughter Rachel, 15, was now scared to be left in the house alone.

Mother-of-three Lisa Grezo, 39, said she had been told her new neighbour was a married barrister with six children.

She said: "It is absolutely terrifying. I have three children and each of them walks to and from school past his house twice a day.

"He invited us across to his house for Christmas drinks. The people who lived there before him said their house had been bought by a couple who were both barristers."

Her husband, Antony, 44, an investment manager, had to work over Christmas so did not take up Hoare's offer of drinks.

Lynn Dobson, 50, owner of Dobson's estate agents, in Ponteland, sold the house to Hoare.

She said: "It was a multi- agency sale and we had a lovely family whose offer was accepted on the house.

"I got a telephone call to say the other agent had been on the phone with a much higher offer and that is what they were going to go with."

Hoare won his £7m fortune in August 2004 while on weekend leave from prison.

Hoare has spent most of his life since 1973 behind bars for offences including rape, attempted rape and indecent assault.

A judge once told him: "Every moment you are at liberty, some woman somewhere is at risk."