A pervert who groped three people after convincing them that he was an Indian holy man with special powers has been jailed for 16 months.

Twisted Kalik Ji, 35, used sleight of hand tricks to persuade families he was a messenger from God after he moved to the UK two years ago.

But Indian-born Ji used his position to persuade his victims to strip naked and massage them so they could be ”purified”.

Shockingly, Ji also told a 24-year-old woman she would be punished by God if she refused to let him touch her naked body.

Ji pleaded guilty to three counts of sexual abuse against a 24-year-old woman and two teenage boys aged 16 and 18 at Coventry Crown Court.

Sentencing Ji to 16 months in prison, Judge Christopher Hodson told him: ”Because the families believed you were a leader of their sect the families allowed you into their homes.

”You used your position, true or false, as a holy man to get yourself in the position where you committed these offences.

”The aggravating feature here is that you used the pretence of religion to persuade them to take their clothes off and then assaulted them. You breached the trust they and their parents placed in you.

”It is a further aggravating feature that you issued threats. You threatened the second victim that he would be punished by God if he told what you did to him.”

The court heard Ji moved in with a family in Rugby, Warks., in August 2008 and enforced strict rules forbidding anyone from entering the living room without permission.

He persuaded the family’s 24-year-old daughter to leave her fiance and groped her legs and body claiming she would be punished by God if she rejected his advances.

When Ji moved in with another family in Leicester in the December he told an 18-year-old boy that ne needed to be ”purified” with a naked massage and groped his genitals.

The pervert then moved to London where he performed similar assaults on a 16-year-old boy.

Glyn Samuel, prosecuting, told the court: ”He [Ji] would set up residence and become controlling with the families and would have individual sessions with family members and their guests and would use his position as a holy man to get them to reveal secrets about themselves and other members of the family.”

Ji was caught when one family became suspicious about his powers and called the police.

Anthony Bell, mitigating during the hearing last Thursday (4/11), said: ”These are very much one off offences. They should be seen in that context. This is a man of previous good character.”