July 2019: Currently living in Winchburgh, next to a children’s play park and football club where the children’s team train

July 2004

Sex beast suing over slopping out jailed for 7 years

A sex offender who is suing prison authorities because he has been forced to slop out for five months has been given a seven-year jail sentence.

While one judge was considering Nigel Mackenzie’s demand for £12,000 compensation, another was yesterday considering how to deal with him for sexually abusing a young boy.

Lord Wheatley had heard how Mackenzie, 36, tried to keep his past as a sex offender from his victim’s mother in order to take advantage of the boy.

He told the unsuspecting woman that a prison sentence he served in 1993 was for burglary.

But, the High Court in Edinburgh heard, the six-month jail term was handed down in Knightsbridge, London, for an indecent assault on a boy under 16.

The shocked woman – who cannot be identified for legal reasons – discovered later that Mackenzie, 36, had been molesting her son.

In court, Mackenzie, of Forth Drive, Livingston, admitted that during five and a half years he had repeatedly abused the youngster – who was aged between seven and 12 at the time – at a number of addresses in West Lothian.

He also admitted groping the boy’s young friend on one occasion when the boy was about 12.

Advocate depute Sean Murphy QC, prosecuting, told how one of the boys was watching a Harry Potter film on DVD when Mackenzie, sitting beside him, put his hand between the youngster’s legs.

Mackenzie was remanded in custody on February 9 to await a possible trial and during his time in A-Hall in Edinburgh’s Saughton jail had to share a cell without a toilet.

He now claims that the “slopping out” regime amounts to “inhuman or degrading treatment” and wants a judge to order prison authorities to move him to a cell with toilet facilities.

His lawyers told the Court of Session this week that the chamber pot and plastic bottle he was given were not even clean.

Mackenzie is one of seven prisoners in the Edinburgh jail who are demanding a total of £87,000. It is expected that Lord Carloway will give a written ruling on their case in the near future.

Earlier this year, armed robber Robert Napier won a total of £2450 after a landmark ruling which threatened chaos for the Scottish prison system. Important aspects of that case are still the subject of an appeal by the Scottish ministers, who are responsible for the country’s jails.

Many more prisoners are thought to be waiting their turn to claim damages for the practice which continues daily for hundreds of inmates at a number of Scottish prisons.

Mackenzie had been expected to face trial in May but instead pleaded guilty to a charge of serious sexual assault and a charge of indecent behaviour.

Not guilty pleas to allegations of seriously sexually assaulting another young boy and indecent behaviour to a girl, both aged under eight, were accepted by the Crown.

Mr Murphy told the court then how Mackenzie described his activities as “doing the numbers”. He would ply the boy with treats, depending on how many sex acts he would perform and what they were.

“The child indicated that over the years he was too afraid of the accused to tell anyone what was going on,” he added.

He also told how the boy had screamed in pain on one occasion when Mackenzie attacked him.

Yesterday, solicitor advocate Richard Goddard, defending, asked Lord Wheatley to be lenient because Mackenzie’s guilty plea had saved the boys from the ordeal of giving evidence.

The lawyer said Mackenzie had also asked him to express his shame and his acknowledgement that what he had done was “utterly wrong”.

“He is willing to seek help and recognises the need for help to make sense of his own behaviour,” added Mr Goddard.

He said Mackenzie had been suffering from severe depression and low self- esteem.

But, jailing him, Lord Wheatley told Mackenzie: “As you are well aware, this case involves the serious, horrifying abuse of two children over a significant period of time.”

The judge also made an order that Mackenzie should be kept under strict supervision for seven years after his release and added his name to the sex offenders’ register.