A former BBC and ITV presenter is facing jail after admitting a string of sexual assaults on teenage girls.

Peter Rowell, 53, also confessed to making indecent photographs of children and the possession of more than 400 indecent images.

At an earlier hearing at Bristol Crown Court, the father-of-one, from Wickwar, South Gloucestershire, pleaded guilty to 12 counts of indecent assault following complaints from five women.

The assaults occurred between 1989 and the early 1990s when the women were all under 16, the court was told.

Rowell also admitted six counts of making indecent photographs of children, which range from levels one to four - five being the most serious category.

He also pleaded guilty to the possession of 464 indecent images, found in his possession in January 2011.

The prosecution accepted four not guilty pleas, including one rape charge, accepting the alternative charge of indecent assault on the same victim.

Edward Burgess, defending, told the court in January his client was aware a custodial sentence would follow.

Rowell, a well-known face in the West Country, was arrested on April 1, 2011.

He sparked a police hunt when he was reported missing in March after failing to turn up to present his regular afternoon show.

His car had been left in a supermarket car park in Yate. He was found in Keswick, Cumbria.

Rowell, originally from Sunderland, presented the Afternoon Show on BBC Radio Bristol and BBC Somerset - a mixture of music and celebrity interviews.

He was also a news bulletin reader on ITV West for more than 10 years and worked as a DJ for commercial radio station GWR in the 1980s.

Rowell will be sentenced at Bristol Crown Court.