DISGRACED High Wycombe police officer James McKenna has been sent to prison for 18 months for sexually assaulting a male student.

McKenna, 29, of Oakwood, Flackwell Heath, was sentenced at Reading Crown Court on Friday, December 16.

The PC, formerly stationed at High Wycombe, was convicted in November of sexually assaulting the student after a night out, following a two-week trial.

McKenna, who had been a police officer for a year-and-a-half, now faces at least nine months behind bars and will remain on the sex offenders' register for the next ten years.

Sentencing, Judge Stanley Spence told the court how the victim was awoken by McKenna performing a sex act on him.

He said: "The last words you said to him that morning were are you going to get me fired tomorrow?'.

"He felt sick and threw up."

Throughout his trial McKenna insisted that he had been slipped some kind of date rape drug and had no memory of what happened after the two men left the Here and Now bar, in High Wycombe town centre, in September last year.

He maintained this at his sentencing.

During the trial, the victim told the court he invited McKenna to share his bed that night to "crash out" and avoid paying for a taxi home. The pair, who had met three times previously, had done this once before after a similar night out but nothing untoward happened.

McKenna sexually assaulted the man at around 5am the next morning, the court heard.

DNA evidence taken from the victim matched samples taken from McKenna.

The judge said: "The victim had to revisit these events in court.

"This offence is so serious only a custodial sentence can be justified."

Patricia May, defending, argued for McKenna to avoid a custodial sentence because of the exceptional circumstances. She told the court he was a fragile person who had a history of self-harm.

She said: "He remains in shock, not only because of the jury's verdict but absolutely shocked and in denial of the possibility that he could have behaved in such a way.

"This is clearly someone of previous good character. He had never shown the slightest homosexual interest at all.

"What happened must have been unpremeditated."

She added that this conviction had ruined McKenna's life and said: "Everything that has happened is punishment for him."

McKenna's sister screamed and was rushed out of court as the sentence was announced.

Many of his family and friends were in court for the hearing and afterwards told of their shock at the conviction.