November 2019

Sex offender avoids prison… again

A learning disabled sex offender broke a ban on contacting children by sending two letters to a 15-year-old girl only weeks after he had been convicted of having under age sex in a park.

Autistic Gary Howard was on a suspended sentence and was working with probation when he sent the two letters to the girl in Okehampton in 2016.

The 15-year-old had her own developmental difficulties and no physical contact resulted from Howard’s approach.

He has the reading and writing ability of a nine-year-old and such a low IQ that he is rated in the bottom 0.1 per cent of the population.

The letters did not come to light until they were found at the girl’s home last year and Howard admitted writing them after two handwriting experts had confirmed he was the author.

He was made subject to a Sexual Harm Prevention Order (SHPO) and a two year suspended sentence in August 2016 after he admitted having sex with a 14-year-old girl in a park in Okehampton.

The SHPO prohibited any contact with girls under 16 and had only just been put in place when he wrote the letters, which were sent between August 2016 and January 2017.

Howard, aged 31, of Turpins Plot, Okehampton, admitted breaching the SHPO and was ordered to undergo sex offenders treatment during 60 days of rehabilitation activities under a three year community order passed by Judge Peter Johnson at Exeter Crown Court.

He told him he was not going to implement the suspended sentence, which has no expired, because of the range of severe learning difficulties from which Howard suffers.

He said:”Anyone who has seen the letters will realise that they are written by someone of very limited intellectual functioning ability. It is almost as if they were being written as an equal rather than as a predatory adult.”

The judge noted that the letters were written before the probation intervention had time to have an effect following the 2016 sentence.

He said that Howard’s self imposed isolation from the world over the past three years has also been a kind of punishment for him.

Miss Rachel Drake, prosecuting, said the current case came to light when the letters were found in the girl’s room and shown to her parents, who promptly contacted the police.

Howard had initially been accused of sexual activity with the girl because of the contents of the letters but these charges were later dropped.

Mr Lee Bremridge, defending, said the 2016 sentence had been suspended because of Howard’s autism, ADHD, and severe intellectual disadvantages.

These offences occurred in the first weeks of the order before his work with the probation service had begun to bear fruit. He has stayed out of trouble and lived in virtual isolation for almost three years.

Mr Bremridge said they probation service recommended a further lengthy period of supervision which will try to help Howard integrate into adult society for the first time

October 2016

Man (27) who had sex with schoolgirl avoids jail after top judges ruled he deserved “compassion”

An Okehampton man who had sex with a 14-year-old girl has avoided jail for a second time after top judges ruled he deserved “compassion”.

Gary Alan Richard Howard, 27, of Turpins Plot, was given a two-year suspended jail term at Exeter Crown Court on August 15.

But the Attorney-General, Jeremy Wright QC, argued that was far too soft and urged Appeal Court judges to lock him up.

Refusing to jail him, however, the judges pointed to his low IQ, his own vulnerability and previous good character.

Howard met the schoolgirl in a park and was aware that she was 14, Lady Justice Sharp told the London court.

They exchanged ‘many thousands of messages’ with each other over social media and had sex three times.

She consented but ‘found the acts painful and uncomfortable’.

Howard ‘scratched her and bit her during one such encounter’, said the judge.

He admitted three counts of sexual activity with a child but was allowed to walk free by the Crown Court judge.

A psychologist’s report said that Howard has a diagnosis of ADHD and suspected traits of autistic spectrum disorder.

He suffers from depression and has a ‘history of intentional self-harm and suicidal thoughts’.

And the judge who sentenced him took the view that Howard and his victim’s ‘mental ages were much closer than their chronological ages’.

Paul Jarvis, for the Attorney-General, told the Appeal Court that a suspended sentence was ‘unduly lenient’.

He pointed to the ‘significant disparity in age’ between Howard and his victim, and that there were ‘three offences committed against this child’.

It was clear from Howard’s police interviews that he ‘knew how old she was, knew it was an offence to have sexual intercourse with her and that, if it ever came to light, he would be in trouble’, added the barrister.

The judge ‘gave too much weight’ to Howard’s learning difficulties, he argued.

Adam Morgan, for Howard, said it was not a case of a sophisticated individual looking to exploit a much younger victim.

That was because of his ‘particular cognitive and intellectual impairment’ which ‘mitigated’ the impact of the age gap.

He would be ‘vulnerable in custody’ and, in the ‘unusual’ circumstances of his case, there were ‘ample reasons’ to suspend his jail term, added Mr Morgan.

The barrister pointed to Howard having no previous convictions and to his remorse.

Lady Justice Sharp, sitting with Mr Justice Nicol and Mr Justice Garnham, rejected the Attorney-General’s bid to jail Howard.

“This offender had severe learning difficulties, a low IQ and a low emotional maturity, all of which were relevant to culpability,” she said.

“He was vulnerable and of previous good character.

“We do not for one moment minimise the serious nature of the offending, or the significance of it for the victim.

“However, we have concluded, just, that while the sentence was a lenient and compassionate one, it was not unduly lenient.”