A CARER who groped four women on buses in Bournemouth and Poole has been spared prison.

Trunalkumar Patel, 30, sexually assaulted his victims by touching their thighs, knicker line or bottom as they travelled alone.

He told police he was just “making friends” during the incidents and pleaded guilty at Bournemouth Magistrates’ Court last month to four counts of sexual assault.

Yesterday he appeared at Bournemouth Crown Court and was handed a six-month prison sentence, suspended for two years and told he would have to sign the sex offenders’ register.

Stuart Ellacott, prosecuting, said the first incident happened on February 13 when Patel tried to talk to the victim.

“After a short while she felt his right hand touch her on the left knee and begin to slide up aiming for the area between her legs.”

Before Patel reached that point the victim got up and left the bus, he told the court.

The second incident happened on March 4 when Patel “cupped” a woman’s bottom as she tried to leave the bus.

He also rubbed his hand up a woman’s leg on the same day.

Mr Ellacott told the court the final incident happened on March 20 when the victim felt Patel repeatedly rub her knicker line before moving his hand up and down her leg and thigh.

One of the victims told police that she used the buses frequently but found it more “difficult” now and said she was “disgusted” by what had happened in such a public place.

Nicholas Robinson, mitigating, told the court that Patel was “deeply embarrassed” about what he’d done.

He said he was married and his wife had given birth to their son on April 7. She had recently been admitted to hospital.

Mr Robinson said Patel had already been punished for the offence because he had lost his good character and his job as a carer.

He said Patel, who has a Masters degree, was an intelligent man and added: “He knows the effect his behaviour has had on the victims in this case.”

Recorder Nicholas Atkinson QC told Patel: “I have no doubt that you realise the seriousness of these offences and distress caused to the victims.

“No unaccompanied woman travelling on public transport should be treated in the sort of offensive way you treated these women.”