Two former members of 1960s rock and roll band The Tremeloes have been acquitted of indecently assaulting a 15-year-old girl in a Chester city centre hotel room 48 years ago.

Leonard 'Chip' Hawkes, 70, and 73-year-old Richard Westwood, who both pleaded not guilty to the assault which was alleged to have happened after a gig in the spring of 1968, had been due to stand trial in February 2017.

But the BBC has reported that a judge at Reading Crown Court ordered the ageing rockers be found not guilty at a hearing this morning (July 22), after the Criminal Prosecution Service told the court there was no evidence to offer.

The pair appeared at Chester Magistrates Court back in December to enter their not guilty pleas.

Who are The Tremeloes?

Originally called Brian Poole and the Tremeloes, the group formed in Dagenham in 1958 and first charted in the UK in 1963 with a cover of the Isley Brothers’ Twist and Shout.

They continued to have chart-topping success with their own versions of the Contours’ Do You Love Me, Cat Stevens’ Here Comes My Baby and the Four Seasons’ Silence is Golden.

While The Tremeloes are still together today, guitarist and vocalist Westwood, of Laleham Reach in Surrey, left after 51 years’ service in 2012 and Leonard ‘Chip’ Hawkes, of Ellis Road in Crowthorne, left for a second time in 1988 to pursue a solo career.