Jail for the pervert who fell into trap
Court Reporter A PERSISTENT pervert was caught trying to meet a 13-year-old girl in an undercover police sting – four years after falling into a similar trap set by paedophile hunters Dark Justice.
David Curran was given a suspended prison sentence in January 2016 after turning up on Newcastle Quayside in 2014 to meet what he hoped was a 15-year-old and also being found with indecent images of children.
But just months after that sentence expired, he was back at it again in an online chatroom, using the disturbing profile name ‘Daddy’s bed.’
This time he was told by the person running the decoy profile “Shannon” that she was 13 – to which he replied “nice”.
Prosecutor Andrew Walker said Curran requested a private chat with the girl, who had initially advertised herself as 18 but quickly revealed she was underage.
Mr Walker said: “The defendant said he was 58 and that he liked younger girls.
“He spoke of going on a date, spending the night with her and referred to her as ‘princess’ and ‘beautiful.’
“He confirmed her age and was told again she was 13.
“He said he would kiss her and would ‘like to have a beautiful young girlfriend like you.’
“There were frequent messages about kissing and cuddling and he would refer to himself as daddy in a lot of the messages.
“He said if they went out together they would say he was her dad. “His profile was called ‘Daddy’s bed.’” Some of the messages were sent when he was told she was at school, having been informed she was in Year 8. Mr Walker said: “His language became increasingly sexualised.
“He asked for pictures in her school uniform and spoke of undressing her and of ‘lots of sex.’
“On May 24 he said there should be a definite plan to meet the following day.
“He said he would like to bring her a present, like a teddy bear.
“He said he wanted her to wear a short skirt.”
At 8am the following day, police raided his then-flat in Blyth and arrested him.
On a tablet, they found 170 pictures of children from the internet, mainly females but none of them indecent.
The 59-year-old, of no fixed address, pleaded guilty to attempting to have sexual communication with a child and two counts of breaching a sexual offences prevention order imposed as part of the sentence in 2016 – by having a tablet without notifying his monitoring officer and by possessing photographs of children on the device.
He was jailed for two years and given a sexual harm prevention order for 10 years and must sign the sex offenders register for 10 years.