A SIGN WRITER who posed for a photo wearing just French knickers and skeleton body paint told a jury he had dressed up for a Halloween party.

Derrick Hooley, who is on trial accused of sexually abusing two children three decades ago, denied getting sexual gratification from putting on ladies underwear.

He was shown photos in the witness box of him in frilly pants and bras and said: "I was just trying them on to see what they looked like - to see if they fitted."

Hooley, 69, of Main Street, Farnhill, near Keighley, denies 17 sexual offences said to have taken place against a boy and a girl in Skipton in the mid to late 1980s.

He is accused of 12 offences of indecent assault and indecency with a child, relating to the boy, and five charges involving the girl, including indecent assault, indecency with a child, and an allegation of taking an indecent photo of her.

Hooley told the court yesterday he was born in Ilkley and lived in Skipton at the time of the alleged offences.

He was a self employed sign writer and then employed at Airedale General Hospital.

He walked round his home naked and did sign painting work in the nude, but only after the period in which he was said to have committed offences.

Hooley told his barrister, Robin Frieze, he had never been in trouble with the police.

He had never had any sexual contact with either of the complaints and had not seen them for years.

He had been interested in naturism and walked around his house naked as part of that hobby.

The allegations of sexual abuse came out of the blue when this "Jimmy Savile thing cropped up" in 2013.

Questioned by Christine Egerton, for the Crown, Hooley said he was not a cross-dresser or a transvestite.

He used to dress in ladies underwear for drag and fancy dress parties. He wore a bra filled with jellies to give him a bust.

He said the Halloween outfit had a white cape to go with it.

Miss Egerton asked: "Did you obtain sexual gratification from wearing ladies' underwear?"

Hooley replied: "No".

He denied wearing ladies underwear when the police first asked him about it because he was embarrassed.

The man who claims Hooley sexually abused him said he wore pink ladies underwear and baby oil. He alleges he also saw him in silk knickers, a bra and a basque.

The woman says he grabbed her breasts when she was a child, put body paint on her when she was topless and photographed her when she was posing naked.

The trial continues.