Sex calls shame of ex-Ukip chairman
Victims left terrified by disgusting messages
THE former chairman of Ukip in Scotland has pleaded guilty to making a string of vulgar phone calls to women.
Arthur ‘Misty’ Thackeray, admitted carrying out ten sexual offence charges involving ten women over a two-year period.
All of the calls were made from his home in Glasgow’s East End, from premises in Colme Street in Edinburgh’s New Town, and ‘elsewhere’.
Ukip Scotland leader and MEP David Coburn’s office is at the Edinburgh address. Thackeray had worked as chief of staff to Mr Coburn and formerly ran companies ‘in the security and private investigations industry’.
Records showed Thackeray used his nickname ‘Misty’ when he phoned a taxi firm for a lift from his former office to Haymarket station on the night some calls were made. Yesterday, Thackeray admitted at Glasgow Sheriff Court nine charges of intentionally sending or directing ‘sexual verbal communication’ between 2010 and 2015.
One charge pre-dates the Sexual Offences Act brought in in 2009 and was a breach of the peace charge between 2007 and 2008.
The court heard none of the women, whose ages ranged from 25 to 66, knew Thackeray or how he got their numbers, but it is believed he took some from posters advertising slimming classes and one from an advert in a shop window.
Thackeray, 55, told one woman he was watching adult material and thinking of her and carrying out a sex act.
Procurator fiscal depute Mark Allan said a 25-year-old woman was texted about meeting at a swingers’ club.
When she called him he said he had the wrong number then sent a message saying: ‘You sounded really nice on the phone, do you know what I would like to do to you?’
Her partner pretended to Thackeray the woman was a 14-year-old girl so the calls would stop. The new mother told police she was ‘terrified’.
Thackeray phoned four of the women on December 18, 2015, including a 33-year-old of whom he asked inappropriate sexual questions.
In some calls women could hear sexual activity in the background, which made them think he was watching pornographic material while speaking to them.
The matter was first reported to the police in September 2013. Mr Allan said: ‘There was insufficient evidence… until December 2015, when another woman reported the calls being made to her.’
Although the calls were made from a withheld number, the woman’s phone service provider traced the number registered to Thackeray.
His phones were analysed and it was found he had called Central Taxis in Edinburgh on December 18, 2015.
Mr Allan said: ‘There was a call, the accused’s voice identified, made to the taxi company. He arranged for a taxi to take him from the office where he worked in Edinburgh where he was the chief of staff for an MEP, to take him to Haymarket station.’
The women said they were ‘disgusted’ and one said she felt ‘violated and alarmed’.
Sheriff Martin Jones, QC, deferred sentence until next month.