By the age of 19, Hughes had 17 convictions for crimes including assault, burglary, theft, criminal damage, threatening behaviour, motoring offences and possession of weapons. He received two custodial sentences before 1995: As a teenager he served three months in a youth detention centre for the motoring offences. In the late 1980s, he served seven months in an adult prison for theft. Hughes had been accused of indecently assaulting girls aged three, five and nine; police revealed that, during the three years preceding the murder of Sophie Hook, they had interviewed him in connection with five allegations "brought by, or on behalf of, children." In one case, in 1986, the child's parents stopped the case to spare their daughter the ordeal of giving evidence. In the other cases, the charges were dropped by the Crown Prosecution Service "because the victims were so young and could not have given reliable evidence."