A HOSPITAL doctor formerly from Westhoughton has been jailed for nine months after picking up a boy in a gay nightclub and taking him back to his flat for sex.

The career of Dr Aman Kumar, aged 34, a former senior house officer at Hull Royal Infirmary, today lay in ruins after he admitted picking up the 14-year-old who was being led out of a gay nightclub because he was under 18.

Hull Crown Court was told that the boy had gone to the bar with a drag queen on a night out with pals from a hairdressers.

Kumar told police he thought the boy was above the age of consent of 16.

He pleaded guilty to one offence of a serious sexual act on the boy and also admitted possessing a quantity of ecstasy.

Jailing him for nine months yesterday Judge Robert Moore said: "The people who advised a reduction in the age of consent to 16 in Parliament were warned many times it was an open charter for predatory men to pick up and have sex with boys half their age. This was such a situation. I take the view that only a custodial sentence can be justified."

He said the boy had been deeply affected by the incident but he accepted the doctor's whole life had been destroyed by the one act.

Prosecuting barrister Patrick Palmer said Kumar admitted to police he was attracted to young men.