Vigilantes trap man meeting ‘teens’

PAEDOPHILE hunters confronted their target after luring him to an isolated spot, a court has heard.

Steven Morris had spent a number of weeks sending sexually explicit messages and photographs to what he thought were girls aged 13 and 14 in the run-up to the incident. But he was in fact communicating with two women in Swansea acting as socalled paedophile hunters.

Swansea Crown Court heard that in November last year Morris, 55, contacted what he thought were two young girls on the hi5 social media site.

Prosecutor Ian Wright said the communication “soon became sexual” and Morris started sending explicit messages to the “girls”, along with photographs and a video.

The court heard the social media profiles of the girls were fakes set up by Swansea paedophile hunters.

Mr Wright said Morris communicated with the decoy profiles over a number of weeks, telling them he wanted sex with them, even though they repeatedly told him their ages.

The prosecutor said that on December 5 last year Morris went to Fendrod Lake on Swansea Enterprise Zone, where he was approached by “members of the vigilante group”.

The defendant drove off, but later that day the paedophile hunters called him on his mobile phone. Morris agreed to meet them and was subsequently detained by the group, and police were called.

Morris, of Gowerton Road, Penclawdd, had previously pleaded guilty to two counts of inciting a child to perform a sex act, one count of attempting to incite a child to perform a sex act and one count of possession of an indecent image.

For each of the inciting and attempting to incite offences, Morris was sentenced to 14 months in prison, and for the possession of the indecent image to three months. All the sentences will run concurrently, making a total of 14 months, with the overall sentence being suspended for two years.

Morris will be on the sex offenders register for 10 years, and was made the subject of sexual harm prevention order for the next five years.