Teret denied friendship with Savile

Paedophile DJ "Ugly" Ray Teret attempted to distance himself from his former mentor Jimmy Savile.

He claimed that contrary to press reports they were not close, he had never lived with him, nor acted as his chauffeur.

Salisbury-born Teret also denied he had appeared on screen with him on BBC's Top Of The Pops, where Savile was said to have introduced him "as my friend Ray Teret".

Teret said: "He didn't introduce me to anyone. He would say this is my driver, my mechanic, my cleaner. He would make up something, whatever dream came into his head. 'My accountant', he would call me most times."

Teret said he first met Savile in the late 1950s when he presented the then teenager with #5 for winning a singing contest at a Manchester ballroom.

Teret went on to become a waiter at The Ritz ballroom in Manchester city centre in the early 1960s and it was there that he met Savile again, who remembered him as "The Singer".

He was then offered a job at his Jimmy Savile Disc Club in Higher Broughton.

Teret said: "He explained how to count the beats on the record, the tempo. How to project to the back of the hall rather than shouting, things like that.

"He told me to do the first hour, which was nerve-racking. I was learning to be a disc jockey."

Eight months later he cut ties with Savile, he claimed, and went on to host his own DJ nights at the Beat City cellar club in Manchester.

In 1965 he landed a job at pirate station Radio Caroline - his signature tune being Jungle Fever by The Tornados.

He said he gained his "Ugly Ray" nickname at the station's opening party when he was asked on stage what he would prefer to be called.

He said: "I said 'call me ugly'. That is what my mother called me. 'Come in ugly', that is what she would say. It was a joke. I thought it would just last for the night."

It led to him sporting a gold bracelet with the word emblazoned on it - which he proudly told the court he has worn up to this day.

After working there for 12 months on a then princely weekly wage of #850, he opened up a clothes boutique in the Isle of Man.

He said he wanted to cash in on the Carnaby Street fashion craze at the time but the island proved not to be the ideal location and he lost his savings.

Teret said: "When we opened it the first guy in said 'can I have some wellies?'."

In 1970 back in Manchester he set up his own DJing business with his father.

He also helped run a music shop in south Manchester and was a presenter on the city's Radio Piccadilly.

His regional fame grew and he drove luxury cars with personalised number plates.

Teret claimed he was not in regular contact with Savile from the mid-60s to the end of the 70s and said Savile never phoned him personally in that period.

He said: "He disappeared from Manchester and went back to Leeds. On an odd occasion when he came over I got a message saying Savile is going to be at the fire station or at the town hall or wherever and would you meet him, and I went."

Asked about a photograph of himself sitting next to Savile in deckchairs, he denied it was a holiday snap.

He said he thought it was taken in Blackpool in 1978 and the occasion was "a handicapped children's outing which Mr Savile did".

The pair did travel together though to the Jersey Flower Festival in the early 1970s. Teret wrote about this in a book manuscript entitled The DJ's Bible, which police recovered on his arrest.

In the journal, in which Teret described Savile as "a genius", Teret said he loaded the car on to the ferry and then drove to appearances.

But he denied being Savile's chauffeur for a time in the 1960s.

Teret went on to work for Signal Radio in Staffordshire and later put adverts in Loot claiming to be a pop impresario looking for a talented singer.

He was jailed for six months in 1999 after he was found guilty of unlawful sexual intercourse with a 15-year-old girl when he was aged 57.

Teret had also served two six-month prison sentences in the 1960s for driving while disqualified.