‘Smelly’ man tried to massage OAP’S legs against her will in bizarre incident
DEFENDANT HAD ‘ONGOING AND RELAPSING’ MENTAL HEALTH PROBLEMS
A MAN tried to massage a pensioner’s legs in her home and against her will in a “bizarre” case.
Ian Martin Paul Shrieves was allowed into the property but was eventually told to leave and his victim contacted police.
A judge at Caernarfon Crown Court on Monday said the defendant has mental health problems and gave him a twoyear community order for attempted sexual assault.
Prosecutor Elen Owen said the woman, in her 70s, lived alone at her house in the Bangor area.
Shrieves, 52, went to her home on February 6 last year and rang the doorbell.
The victim recognised the man but said he was “smelly”.
The prosecutor said Shrieves initially told his victim “it’s cheap” and – thinking he was referring to potential gardening work he could do – the pensioner let him in.
He sat on a chair and she was on the sofa. He said he wanted to “comfort her”.
The prosecutor added: “He said ‘I want to massage you. I want your body against mine.’
“She was shocked and she told him to get out.”
But the court heard Shrieves instead got on his knees.
He told her “I can feel your legs if you like” and moved towards her as if to massage her legs.
However, the pensioner rejected his advances and told him to leave again .
But the prosecutor said Shrieves then made a sexually suggestive remark and then “moved his hand towards his groin”.
He made another sexually explicit comment before the pensioner “forcefully” told him to get out.
She alerted a neighbour, who insisted she dial 999.
Owen Edwards, defending, Shrieves has personal problems.
He said: “He behaved in such a bizarre way.
“This was a day of, I was going to say, madness, by Mr Shrieves.”
But he added: “He was living in accommodation with no gas or electricity. He had not been eating and he had become smelly.
“He was in some ways living the most limited of lives imaginable.
“In custody (on remand for the said last year) he has in some respects found that a more secure and stable place to live.”
The barrister suggested that one of the conditions of his sentence be to “prevent him from offering massage services”.
The judge Her Honour Judge Nicola Jones said it was clear Shrieves has “significant mental health problems”. These are “ongoing and relapsing”.
She gave him the community order with 80 days of rehabilitation activity.
She did not include the suggested requirement not to massage anyone but ordered Shrieves to go on a six-month drug treatment programme and a 12-month trail monitoring scheme.
Furthermore, he was given a five-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order preventing him from harassing or intimidating any female, or seeking to do so, or to touch any female not known to him.
The judge also imposed a restraining order for Shrieves not to enter a certain address in Gwynedd.
She added: “The purpose of the sentence is to protect Mr Shrieves in the future, and to rehabilitate him, and also to protect vulnerable females in the community.
“Mr Shrieves, I very much hope you will use the order to turn your life around and get back to a better place than you were in at the start of all this.”