Fife family have ‘lost faith in justice’

A father whose children were sexually abused by a Fife paedophile says the family have lost faith in the justice system after his jail sentence was slashed.

The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was disgusted to hear David Glass had successfully appealed against a five-year jail term imposed in January.

The former landlord was found guilty of sexual abuse against children carried out in the ’80s and ’90s in the East Neuk.

It was his second conviction, having been previously convicted in 2014 at Dunfermline Sheriff Court of sexually abusing four more children over an eight-year period between 2004 and 2012.

He was given a three-and-a-half year sentence but was released in early 2016.

Lawyers for the 60-year-old have successfully argued his most recent sentence was “excessive” due to the “cumulative impact” of his previous prison term, with the Court of Appeal reducing it to three years.

The father, whose children were victims in the 2014 conviction, told of the family’s living nightmare after reporting the sex offender to the police – and how they feel let down by the justice system.

He said: “When we first found out about the abuse, my wife was pregnant at the time. On that very day, our baby died inside her. She was too far along in the pregnancy so she had to give birth. I took the boys to the police station and I took my wife to the hospital.

“When we came back home, he (Glass) was quite merrily 400 yards from where we lived. He was the first person we ran into when we got home that day.

“Because he was our landlord, we looked at him like a friend. He would quite regularly come round with a box of ice cream for the children.

“We were living in one of his properties when I went to the police and the first thing he did was try to evict us.

“He stopped accepting the rent and he got an eviction, making us homeless.

“Then, while we were waiting for the trial, he used to come and sit around the corner from our house.

“The only way for the kids to get in at night was to go past him. He was trying to intimidate us.

“He told people in the area that we were lying and making it up. My children, my wife and myself were all threatened by various people in the lead up to the trial. Then I had to sit outside that courtroom and listen to my children crying as they gave evidence.

“He was found guilty and was jailed, which gave us a bit of peace. But then he got released and was allowed to come back to the house where he had committed the offences, which is less than a mile from where we live.”

He added: “He only served 19 months for what he did to our family, out of a four-and-a-half year sentence. We feel let down by the justice system.”

The family now fear Glass will return to the area after his release and hope to move away.

Imperfect at the best of times, there are occasions when our justice system is simply inexplicable. One can quite understand the torment of the father who has seen the man who abused his children succeed in an application to have his jail term slashed.

The onus on the justice system to get it right first time is enormous.

Being the victim of any crime is difficult, and for the unfortunate children who fall prey to paedophiles the emotional scars may never heal.

Seeing your abuser jailed must at least bring some level of comfort and closure, so one can only imagine how it feels to then see the perpetrator winning the right to an early reprieve.

It is a particularly cruel twist of fate, and cannot be easily justified.

Lawyers argued the sentence was excessive due to the “cumulative impact” of a previous jail term.

The family of the victims have been left distraught. No doubt it is the result of complex legal negotiations but that does little to address the very understandable concerns of those most intimately involved in what is a deeply traumatic case.

The inevitable conclusion of the family is that they have been let down.

The legal case may have been made, but our justice system is curious indeed if it ignores the human cost.

Former landlord David Glass was found guilty of sexually abusing children.