Paedophile who abused son aged two loses appeal

A MAN jailed for sexually assaulting his two-year-old son admitted “normal sex did nothing for him”, a court has heard.

Details emerged as the paedophile, who cannot be identified, lost his challenge to being found guilty of abusing the boy.

He was convicted at Newry Crown Court last September of sexually assaulting his son in 2011 as he babysat him and sentenced to five months in jail.

At the time the man, referred to as QD, was living apart from the boy’s mother. She claimed that when she returned home ‘Jack’ (not his real name) described being sexually assaulted by his father.

When she challenged QD he stated: “You knew who I was, it was not going to change, and if you accept that we would be together.”

According to Jack’s mother, this referred to her discovering child pornography on QD’s computer. The Appeal Court heard he “admitted that he had been watching the images, explaining that normal sex did nothing for him”. No report was made to police at the time, with the boy’s mother claiming fear of QD.

But in 2015 another woman who waslivingwithQDinEnglandalleged to police that he had used her laptop to show her pornography involving young children.

In her statement she described how he had asked if she would have a child with him so they could have an “open” family — which she understood to mean he wanted a child to abuse. He also told her he had had sex with his son, the court was told.

Although a charge of rape of a child was withdrawn, QD was found guilty of sexual assault, but appealed the conviction.

Defence lawyers challenged the admission of hearsay evidence from Jack’s mother. They also claimed there were flaws in directions to the jury on the evidence of the woman in England.

But dismissing the appeal, Lord Justice Stephens said jurors were aware they had to assess the reliability of evidence from Jack and his mother.

He said there appeared strong grounds for the prosecution to have made a bad character application to have evidence from the woman in England support claims by Jack’s mother.

He also noted that “there were striking similarities” in the evidence of Jack’s mother and the woman in England, involving “attempts by QD to corrupt both of them so that he could indulge a propensity not only for possessing child pornography... but also for committing sexual acts involving young children”.