Le Vell in court on child sex charges

Coronation Street actor Michael Le Vell was today making his first appearance in Crown Court accused of child sex offences.

The star, who plays car mechanic Kevin Webster in the ITV soap, was appearing at Manchester Crown Court under his real name of Michael Turner.

The 48–year–old has been charged with 19 offences including six counts of raping a child, six allegations of indecently assaulting a child and seven counts of sexual activity with a child.

The alleged offences relate to one complainant and all took place between 2001 and 2010.

Le Vell appeared at Manchester Magistrates’ Court last month and is on bail on condition he surrenders his passport, does not contact named witnesses and does not have unsupervised contact with any child under the age of 14.

He has not yet entered a plea but has stated publicly he is innocent.