A Bradford licensee today spoke of his relief after he was cleared of raping and sexually assaulting a young girl in West Sussex in the 1960s.

Barry Watson was put on trial at Chichester Crown Court after a woman told police she was sexually assaulted by him from the age of nine.

But the trial ended yesterday when Mr Watson, 57, of Oak Avenue, Manningham, was found not guilty of three charges and the jury failed to reach verdicts on four others. Judge Anthony Thorpe recorded formal verdicts of not guilty to all the charges of rape, indecent assault and indecency with a child after the Crown Prosecution Service did not order a retrial.

Speaking after the verdict Mr Watson, who runs the Oakleigh Hotel, said the last 15 months had been hell for him and his wife.

"I have been through absolute agony," he said. "You cannot name the woman who has accused me and yet there is my name splashed all over the newspapers after a complete fabrication of lies.

"I am very well known in Bradford and the amount of phone calls I had was unbelievable. But they have been very supportive, my family and friends and the customers."

During the trial, the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, claimed Mr Watson raped her for the last time when she was 16 and she became pregnant.

Gillian Etherton, prosecuting, said DNA tests showed Mr Watson was 46,000 times more likely to be the father of the child than any other man.

The woman had alleged that she was sexually assaulted by Mr Watson for the first time when she was nine and he was about 17. She also claimed Mr Watson's father, Charles Watson, who died in 1987, raped her when she was ten.

Mr Watson and his father had worked on the construction of the marina at Birdham in the 1960s. The woman said she was abused in Birdham and Donnington at that time but she only told the police in 2001 after watching a television programme about child abuse.

Mr Watson denied raping or sexually assaulting her. He said he had awoken with her in the same bed when she was 16 after a drunken party, and that could be the night she became pregnant.