A VILLAGE publican took advantage of two young customers who fell asleep in the premises after drinking heavily.

On two separate occasions, male drinkers, invited to stay on at the Goldmine after last orders by former landlord Stephen Sample, woke to find him groping them, a court was told.

Sample, 25, who was arrested in a raid at the High Street premises in Willington, County Durham, in February last year, was yesterday jailed for 18 months.

Durham Crown Court heard that, in both cases, Sample asked the men to stay over at the pub after they had drunk heavily at the premises, and then bought them further drinks.

One victim, in his 20s, recalled waking at the pub, believing he had been indecently touched, finding his clothing disturbed.

He was still suffering because of the amount he had drunk and was offered a lift home by Sample at 5.30am.

Caroline Goodwin, prosecuting, said the incident happened overnight from September 12 to 13, 2010, but for months it preyed on the victim’s mind.

“He felt overwhelmed by alcohol at the time, but hovering in the background he felt he had been sexually violated.”

Miss Goodwin said there was a lot of innuendo about what had taken place, and by February last year a second complainant, in his teens, came forward to report a similar incident having taken place when he had been invited to stay over at the pub.

Following the raid and his arrest, Sample denied the allegations.

But on the day his trial was to start at the court, last month, Sample, of St James Gardens, Witton-le- Wear, County Durham, changed his pleas to guilty to two counts of sexual assault.

David Lamb, mitigating, said Sample was of previous good character and the offences took place at a time his life was “spiralling rapidly out of control”.

He said: “He was surrounded by alcohol and found himself in the company of a group of males to whom he was sexually attracted and he would take drugs, as would others in the same company.

“To all intents and purposes, he and some of those customers treated the venue as one big party.

“He was running it at a loss and left with substantial debts of £18,000.

“Clearly, he wasn’t running the pub properly, and he’s now lost the licence and been made bankrupt.

“He knows what he did was wrong and his behaviour needs addressing.

“But, there’s no evidence he’s behaved like this in the past or will in the future.”

Jailing him, Judge Christopher Prince told Sample: “The way you behaved was deeply disturbing and as a result utterly untrue rumours have circulated about these men.”

Sample will be subject to registration as a sex offender for ten years.