Boy George , the British pop star was jailed on Friday for 15 months for imprisoning a Norwegian male escort after a nude photoshoot, in what the judge called a ‘premeditated, callous and humiliating’ assault.

The star was found guilty last month of handcuffing 29-year-old Audun Carlsen and beating him with a metal chain, when he tried to escape the musician’s London apartment.

The singer and disc jockey, who stood trial under his real name George O’Dowd, admitted to police to handcuffing Carlsen to his bed on April 28, 2007, also denied assaulting Carlsen, or hitting him with a metal chain, suggesting to officers that the bruises suffered by the escort could have been there due to the fact , he was HIV positive.

O’Dowd was also ordered to pay 5,000 pounds.

Using the handcuffs to unscrew the wall hook, Carlsen then escaped the apartment onto the street wearing just his underwear, a T-shirt and running shoes.

Defence lawyers arguing on behalf of O’Dowd, who did not give evidence to the court, said that the dispute was regarding claims that Carlsen had stolen photographs from O’Dowd’s computer.

They argued that Carlsen’s suggestion that the attack occurred because of his refusal to have sex with the artist was ‘entire fantasy or a lie’.

O’Dowd has had brushes with the law in the past - in August 2006, he carried out a week of court-ordered community service in New York City for filing a false police report over a non-existent burglary.

As well as the community service, he agreed to undergo drug rehabilitation.

His lawyer Steven Barker said on Friday that O’Dowd was ‘on the road to recovery, I sincerely hope this sentence does not knock him back’.