Paedophile started new life by changing his name for £45
Construction boss tells of ‘conman’ perv
John Dingwall and Gordon Currie
One of Scotland’s most dangerous paedophiles changed his name by deed poll to pose as a respectable businessman.
Depraved Steven Perrie, 56, has been jailed three times for child sex crimes, including possessing more than 400,000 images and 16,000 video clips.
The collection was described as being of “unimaginable evil” and featured children as young as four.
But the former bricklayer was able to spend just £ 45 to legally call himself Steven MacDonald for more than a year.
He set up a company that put him in contact with children – defying an ultra- strict Sexual Offences Prevention Order (SOPO).
His horrified construction boss co-director said he thought Perrie was a “nice guy” and had no idea about his sinister background.
The man, who cannot be named, said: “We were both building a house when plain clothes officers came along and asked him to come with them.
“He just went without asking why, which I thought was odd.
“It was a shock to discover what he
had been involved in. When he got arrested, I spoke to the police.
“They searched all my stuff – my car and van, which he had driven, for devices and things like that.
“Everybody knows he worked with me and people ask if I knew about it.
“Of course I didn’t know about it. He wasn’t near my kids long enough to do anything but he also did work for other people who have children.
“He seemed like a nice and friendly guy.
“I met him through Facebook. He was looking for some pallets of wood and I said I would drop some off because I had some spare.
“He did jobs with me and met a lot of people through work.
“I think he was able to con people.”
Before Per r i e ’ s sordid past came to light, he spent time with the man’s six- year- old son on numerous occasions between 2019 and last year.
He played Minecraft with the boy, even though he knew he was banned from being in contact with children.
Dundee Sheriff Court heard last week how Perrie, from Montrose, paid £ 45 to change his name by deed poll and breached a SOPO.
He admitted failing to comply with sex offender notification requirements by having a Barclays Mastercard between May 2019 and November 2020.
Perrie also breached a SOPO by engaging in a relationship with a 39-year-old woman in Aberdeen and Brechin, without informing the offender management unit.
He had rekindled the romance shortly after the woman had a child with another man and broke the SOPO terms by having ongoing contact with that child.
He also broke the ultra-strict order – put in place to try to protect the public – by owning a Facebook Portal TV device. He again failed to tell the offender management unit and claimed he bought it for his dying mother in Tenerife.
Sentence was deferred and Perrie was remanded in custody for reports.
The court heard a search of Perrie’s home was carried out over suspicions he had child porn and a bank card in his new name was discovered.
Perrie had been jailed on three separate occasions over child sex crimes, beginning in 2004, and
Britain’s biggest child porn haul was discovered.
Some of the material at the most extreme end of the scale had been sourced from Europe, Asia and the Americas.
He was released after 10 months but imprisoned for a second time in 2005 – for downloading yet more sickening images.
At the time, the paedophile drove around his home town, Forfar, in a white Rolls-Royce and gained further notoriety when he bought an old police van with a cage in the back.
Locals nicknamed him “The Child Catcher” – af ter the evi l man employed by Baron Bomburst and Baroness Bomburst to snatch and imprison children from the streets in the 1968 classic movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
In 2012, Perrie was jailed for eight years after his girlfriend reported him to police.
She had found a sick DVD stash hidden in his bedroom, along with a pair of children’s pants.
The SOPO imposed at Forfar Sheriff Court when he was released does not expire until 2024.
It was a shock to discover what he had been involved in