June 2012

Pervert ‘asked girls for pictures’

A pervert with a growth disorder who asked girls as young as 13 to send him pictures of themselves has been spared jail because of difficulties caused by his disability.

Paul Williams, 24, of Croftland Gardens, Carnforth, has a disorder which means he is only 4ft 8ins tall.

Preston Crown Court heard he was a “terribly lonely young man” who had struggled to form adult sexual relationships, and when working as a mechanic was bullied by colleagues who threw his shoes into areas he could not reach and ridiculed him on social networking website Facebook.

Paul Cummings, prosecuting, said Williams befriended a 13-year-old girl from Oxfordshire on a website in December 2010, telling her he was 17, when he was actually 22 at the time, despite her profile clearly showing she was a child.

He asked for her telephone number and repeatedly sent her text messages, asking her to send pictures of herself, which began with a picture of her face.

These pictures escalated to one per day, when he started putting credit on her phone so she could send him increasingly explicit images, which he later transferred to his computer.

Mr Cummings said in return Williams sent indecent pictures of himself and suggested they should meet, but the girl’s father discovered the pictures of her and contacted the police.

Williams’ parents sat crying in the public gallery as the court heard how he also exchanged indecent pictures with a 14-year-old girl from Staffordshire and a 15-year-old girl from Burnley, the latter this year while on bail.

Williams, who had no previous convictions, pleaded guilty to inciting a child to engage in sexual activity and possession of indecent photographs of children.

Joe Hart, defending, asked for his client to be dealt with by way of a community order.

He said Williams was suffering from “self-loathing”, was frightened of actually meeting anybody and lived out his relationships through the internet.

Mr Hart said: “He is a man because of his disability who has led the life of a much younger man.

“He feels he can’t meet women as others would.”

He said that when serving a week in custody earlier this year Williams had been “physically abused” and that he had lost his job.

Judge Anthony Russell said Williams had come “very close indeed” to being sent back to prison by being “very foolish and naive”.

He said: “You had a taste of what that might be like but I am quite satisfied having read all the material about you that this is a case where you require help rather than punishment.”

He handed Williams a three-year supervised community order with a sex offender programme requirement.

He also banned him from unsupervised contact and working with children under 16.

He is also banned from unrecorded internet use.

And he placed him on the Sex Offenders Register for five years.