August 2019

Sex offender attracted to shop mannequins jailed for downloading messaging app

A sex offender who is aroused by shop mannequins has been sent to prison after secretly installing a messaging app on his phone.

Osian Winters has a history of sexual offences against children as well as of performing sexual acts in public.

He is subject to a 10-year sexual harm prevention order designed to limit his access to the internet but he repeatedly breaks it.

Sending him down, a judge said there was no alternative to immediate custody due to his poor record of not complying with court orders.

Swansea Crown Court heard Winters was arrested in August last year after being caught on CCTV pleasuring himself while looking at mannequins in the window of Topshop in Carmarthen town centre.

Police seized his phone and sent it away for examination. It was subsequently found he had installed Telegram, a messaging app which sends highly encrypted messages.

Hannah George, prosecuting, said Winters – who used to go by the name Scott Aaron Williams – had used the app to engage in “sexual conversations” with people in three different chat groups.

Having the app on his phone put him in breach of a previously-imposed sexual harm prevention order.

However it was not until June 23 this year that Winters was arrested for the offence – in the mean time he had already served a prison sentence for other breaches of the order.

In his subsequent interview he said he had been searching the internet for information on cryptocurrencies when he came across the app and decided to download it as his interest in the online financial transactions “outweighed” the breach of the order.

Winters, of Llanboidy, Whitland, Carmarthenshire, admitted breaching a sexual harm prevention order. The court heard he has 13 previous convictions for 26 offences, all for offences of a sexual nature or for breaching court orders related to sexual offending.

His convictions include one for exposing himself and performing a sex act in front of a young girl on the Millennium Coastal Path near Llanelli, exposing himself in Gorslas Park, and engaging in sexual activity in the presence of a child.

In 2016 he was made the subject of sexual harm prevention order after being convicted of six counts of causing or inciting a girl under 16 to engage in sexual activity and two counts of possessing indecent images.

These offences related to extensive and sexually explicit online Skype chats he had with a 15-year-old girl.

Judge Keith Thomas told Winters he had an “appalling record” for sexual offences and non-compliance with court orders.

He said given the defendant’s history he “could not entertain the prospect” of any other sentence than one of immediate custody and jailed him for a year.

December 2018

Pervert breached sexual harm prevention orders

A paedophile who pleasured himself while looking at mannequins in a shop window compared the probation service’s attempts to help him with the Nazi’s persecution of the Jews, a court has heard.

Osian Sebastian Winters sent threatening texts to a police officer and made a threatening phone call to a probation officer just hours after walking out of court.

A judge said the defendant seemed to enjoy trying to beat the system – then sent him to prison.

Swansea Crown Court heard that on December 12 this year Winters appeared at the court over his failure to comply with a requirement he be electronically monitored for the purposes of a curfew.

The six-month curfew had been imposed after he was convicted of pleasuring himself while looking at mannequins in a shop window.

The court heard he didn’t want to tag linked to his address on the city’s Oystermouth Road and wouldn’t move to a probation approved address in Llanelli.

That failure put the 24-year-old in beach of a community order – but instead of breaching him, a new address in Whitland was agreed, and an extra month added to his nightly curfew.

However Tom Scapens, prosecuting, said Winters left the court after the hearing and shortly afterwards texted a police officer with threats directed towards a probation officer.

Later that same day Winters then rang the Llanelli probation office and began making threats to a member of staff – the court heard an “increasingly irate” Winters said he would slit the probation officer’s throat if he was ever in the same room as her, and compared the probation service to the way the Nazi’s persecuted the Jews.

Winters, formerly of Guildhall Square in Carmarthen, had previously pleaded guilty to three offences under the Malicious Communications Act when he appeared in the dock for sentencing.

Winters has previous convictions for more than 20 offences – all of a sexual nature – including one for exposing himself and performing a sex act in front of a young girl on the Millennium Coastal Path, exposing himself in Gorslas Park, and engaging in sexual activity in the presence of a child.

He also has convictions for breaching court orders, and for failing to promptly tell the police about his change of name from Scott Aaron Williams.

In 2016 he was made the subject of sexual harm prevention order after being convicted of six counts of causing or inciting a girl under 16 to engage in sexual activity, and two counts of possessing indecent images.

These offences related to extensive and sexually explicit online Skype chats he had with a 15-year-old girl.

Then in May this year Winters was made the subject of a three-year community order for breaching that 2016 order – after a police officer in Carmarthen spotted him wearing a Vue Cinema uniform they visited his flat and found he had an internet-enabled Samsung television which he had not disclosed, and had created Facebook profile under the name Daniel Price.

It also emerged Winters had made multiple visits to Carmarthen library to use its computers, and had been working at the town’s Vue Cinema.

The defendant was back in court in September after being seen on CCTV ogling mannequins in the window of TopShop in Carmarthen while performing a sex act on himself.

A description Winters was passed to police, and he was tracked down a short distance away.

When questioned by police he said: “Okay boys, I will admit it. I have a bit of a thing for mannequins. When I saw them I started playing with myself – I could not help it.”

The court heard the probation service was no longer prepared to work with him.

Judge Geraint Walters told Winters he clearly had “many, many unresolved and complex issues” which needed to be addressed – and until they were tackled it was likely he would keep becoming back before the courts where he would be sentenced to ever-longer sentences.

The judge revoked the previously imposed community order, and said custody was now the only option.

For breaching the sexual harm prevention order Winters was sentenced to six months in prison, for outraging public decency with the mannequins to four months, and for making the threatening texts and call to a total of six months – all the sentences will run consecutively with each other making a total sentence of 16 months. The defendant will serve half that time in custody before being released on licence to serve the remainder in the community.

May 2018

Paedophile tried to hide what he was doing by using smart TV and library computers

A child sex offender was playing “cat and mouse” with the police trying to hide his internet activities by using a smart TV and computers in his local library, a court has heard.

It also emerged Osian Winters was working in a popular cinema after failing to make full disclosures about his convictions on a job application.

A judge told him he was in denial about the seriousness of his “deviant” sexual interests, and that all the signs pointed to him being a “committed paedophile”.

Swansea Crown Court heard police went to Winters’ flat in Carmarthen town centre in February this year after “concerns” were raised about his employment at the town’s Vue Cinema.

Dean Pulling, prosecuting, said Winters was taken to Ammanford police station for questioning, and denied having any devices for accessing the internet.

However, police searched his home and uncovered a wifi internet router – from that they were able to tell the defendant’s Samsung television in the living room was a “smart” TV connected to the internet. When the browser on the telly was checked it was discovered he was logged-on to Facebook under the name Daniel Price.

Police also found Winters had a Google account which had been used to carry out searches on subjects including how to wipe internet histories, and how to set up password-protected folders.

It also emerged Winters had made multiple visits to Carmarthen library to use its computers – CCTV showed him using the machines, but the court heard the internet histories of the PCs are wiped after user log-offs, and it was therefore not possible to check which sites he had been visiting.

Winters, aged 24, of Guildhall Square, Carmarthen, had previously pleaded guilty to two counts of breaching a sexual harm prevention order (SHPO) when he appeared in the dock for sentencing.

The SHPO was imposed in 2016 after Winters was convicted of six counts of causing or inciting a girl under 16 to engage in sexual activity, and two counts of possessing indecent images.

These offences relate to extensive and sexually explicit online Skype chats he had with a 15-year-old girl.