paedophile’s creche breach
SERIAL SEX OFFENDER CAUGHT LOITERING OUTSIDE CITY NURSERY DESPITE COURT ORDER BANNING HIM FROM DOING SO
A SEX offender previously caught looking at child abuse images in Cardiff Central Library has been sent back to prison for breaching a court order.
David Evans, 37, flouted his Sexual Harm Prevention Order for a fourth time by hanging around outside a nursery and crèche in Cardiff city centre.
Cardiff Crown Court heard the defendant said he felt “demonised” by the Probation Service.
Richard Ace, prosecuting, said the order was imposed in February 2017, banning him from going within 100m of any nursery, school, leisure centre of other facility likely to be used by children.
The defendant breached the order twice in one day on April 5 by approaching the Day Care Centre and Centre for Human Development at Cardiff University. Prosecutors said he was repeatedly reminded of the terms of the order by a support officer in the weeks before the offending.
The court heard security staff at the university saw the defendant trying the doors of the Centre for Human Development on Park Place at about 7pm.
Evans stated he was looking for the library and said: “Did you think I was acting suspiciously?”
Prosecutors said families go to the centre, which specialises in research into children’s development – particularly children with autism spectrum disorder.
Mr Ace told the court it would have been “obvious” there were young children in the building, as toys and children’s furniture were visible through the windows. He said the police later checked CCTV, which showed the defendant walking along Park Place and standing outside the nursery and crèche.
Evans was arrested and replied to the caution: “Am I going to jail? But I’ve worked so hard.”
He denied the breaches and stated he did not know he was outside a nursery.
Prosecutors said he was jailed in 2011 for offences involving indecent images of children and a Sexual Offences Prevention Order was made.
He breached the order in 2012 and was sent back to prison for eight months. There was another breach in 2013 and Evans was put behind bars for 28 months.
The court heard in 2015 “history repeated itself” and there was a further breach, for which the defendant received a 15-month jail term.
Last year he admitted three counts of possessing indecent images of children, one of possessing prohibited images of children and one of possessing extreme pornography.
Prosecutors at that hearing said the defendant was caught looking at child abuse images on his phone while in Cardiff Central Library. Police found 121 indecent images on his device.
His counsel Catherine Flint accepted Evans had an “obsessive” interest in pornography, which he described as “like an addiction”. He was judged by the Probation Service to present a high risk of harm to children and young people.
Evans was then jailed for 30 months and the old order was replaced with a new Sexual Harm Prevention Order.
In relation to the new offences, the defendant, from Tudor Street in Riverside, admitted two breaches.
Lloyd Jenkins, mitigating, said: “He has a complex and challenging character.”
He told the court his client claimed he tried to be open with the Probation Service about his interest in children but felt “demonised”. The court heard Evans was taken into care when he was 15 and has been diagnosed with personality disorder.
Mr Jenkins said the defendant believed he had been “set up to fail”, stating there was a breakdown in support when he was last released from prison.
Judge Michael Fitton QC told him: “You feel sorry for yourself, you blame somebody else, it is always somebody else’s fault you are here.”
Evans was jailed for 27 months and the Sexual Harm Prevention Order remains in place.