‘Cured’ paedophile is spared jail
A PAEDOPHILE escaped a prison sentence yesterday after a court was told that being stabbed in the London Bridge terror attack had helped him overcome his perversion.
Five months before the atrocity Adam Harris was caught with more than 1,000 indecent images and videos of children.
But at his sentencing yesterday his lawyer said he had taken steps to address his offending and had been abused himself as a child.
Judith Benson added: ‘He began to receive counselling for the post-traumatic stress disorder from being stabbed during the London Bridge attacks. He has been left with extreme anxiety, depression and as a result of that was provided counselling and in the course of that dealt with the sexual abuse.’
Judge Deva Pillay imposed a nine-month prison sentence suspended for two years. He told Harris: ‘For well over a year you had been downloading and accessing the indecent material. Needless to say the material was not only distressing but in your case some of the material was of an extreme nature.
‘Anyone that appears before this court with contraband of this extreme nature – it is to prison they go. In your case I have had sight of a very detailed pre-sentence report and that of a clinical psychologist.
‘She says there are certain risks to your receiving a custodial sentence and that you have engaged with her in the process of overcoming these interests that you have.’
Miss Benson had asked for reporting restrictions, saying that newspaper stories had caused great distress to Harris’s mother and worsened his stress disorder. The judge refused this.
Patricia Deighan, prosecuting, had told Blackfriars Crown Court the indecent images included ‘very young children – a boy of 11 or 12, a girl nine or ten and an indecent image of an infant’.
Harris, of Ashington, Northumberland, had admitted three counts of making indecent images of children at Highbury magistrates court. The judge also ordered a 60-day rehabilitation course along with a five-year sexual harm prevention order and ten years on the sex offenders register.
Eight people were killed and 48 injured in the London Bridge attack last June 3. Three jihadists – Khuram Butt, Rachid Redouane and Youssef Zaghba – were shot dead by police after they ran amok.