A man strangled women and children during 24 years of abuse.

Colin Gillies, 52, from Inverbervie, Aberdeenshire, smothered victims at houses in Aberdeen and Inverbervie.

Gillies, formerly of Townhead, Inverbervie, was originally placed on an Order for Lifelong Restriction (OLR) and ordered to serve 39 months in prison.

He was originally jailed at Aberdeen Sheriff Court but was sent to the High Court in Edinburgh because of its greater powers of sentencing.

Judge Lady Carmichael told him he had a "psychopathic personality disorder" and would only be released when authorities no longer deemed him a risk to the public.

Gillies began the attacks in 1990 at a house in Aberdeen where the first woman was repeatedly punched, kicked, hit on the head with a broom and had a pillow placed over her head and mouth.

Between 1993 and 1997, he then hit a second woman on the head and body with a book, throttled her and put a cushion over her head and mouth at another house in Aberdeen and a cottage in Turriff.

From 2009, a third woman suffered at Gillies hands. She was held down on a bed, with a pillow placed over her head to restrict her breathing.

Gillies also subjected an 11-year-old boy and a girl, from the age of four onwards, during which they were shouted at, threatened, pushed and punched.

He also throttled a girl at an address in Inverbervie, when she was aged between nine and 12, and carried out similar assaults on a boy who was pushed, punched and kicked from the age of ten.