Glitter: The Popstar Paedophile: One-off feature documentary explores the dark double life of Gary Glitter

And with fame and success came the trappings of wealth, including a Rolls Royce and a Hampshire mansion, not to mention the adoration of fans, all in a haze of drugs and alcohol. But the singer, real name Paul Francis Gadd, had – and still has – a very dark side, one of paedophilia and child sexual assault.

Netflix’s upcoming three-part series Hunting Gary Glitter, which is produced by Voltage Films, the people behind recent hit Scoop, will chronicle the serial child abuser’s crimes, with exclusive access to those who brought him to justice.

There is also a programme in the works at Prime Video, while the one-off documentary Glitter: The Popstar Paedophile on ITV1 tonight explores his dark double life over the years.

The film weaves historical victim testimony, archive footage and interviews with those who met the singer on the showbiz circuit as well as lawyers involved in both the prosecution and defence of Glitter during various trials across the decades.

It also looks into how he used his charismatic onstage persona to cover up his predatory offstage behaviour, meaning that he was only brought to justice decades after his chart success.

Four years after one of his victims spoke out to the News of the World in 1993, Glitter was eventually arrested for building up a library of more than 4,000 images of child pornography.

Before he was handed a four-month prison sentence, the court was told that the images were “about as hardcore, about as degrading as it is possible to be”.

Following his release, Glitter fled to Cambodia and then Vietnam, where he was later convicted of committing sexual assaults on children.

Returning to the UK after serving nearly three years in a Vietnamese jail, he would then face another trial for assaulting three schoolgirls between 1975 and 1980.

Glitter was the first person to be arrested under Operation Yewtree, the Met Police’s investigation launched in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal, in 2012.

He was eventually jailed in 2015 for attempted rape, four counts of indecent assault and one of sex with a girl under 13.

Police would later describe him as a “habitual sexual predator who took advantage of the star status afforded to him”.

In February last year, Glitter was released from low-security prison HMP The Verne in Portland, Dorset, after serving half of his 16-year sentence.

However, he was back behind bars less than six weeks later after breaching his licence conditions by allegedly viewing downloaded images of children.

Over the years, Glitter has been accused of showing a “total lack of remorse” towards his victims. And this programme asks why those he preyed upon were largely ignored when they first came forward.