A pervert convicted of downloading vile child sexual abuse images was back in court again after he smashed up his mobile phone with a hammer.
Francis Unsworth, 65, of Bootle, was sentenced to a community order for six offences of downloading images of children and extreme pornographic images involving animals when he last appeared in court in May. A Sexual Harm Prevention Order (SHPO) was also imposed for five years restricting his phone and internet use.
The 65-year-old admitted in Liverpool Crown Court on Wednesday, March 16, he breached this court order. Iain Criddle, prosecuting, said that conditions of the SHPO included having to tell police about any device which has internet access and not to delete its history.
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Mr Criddle said: “The day after the order was imposed police attended his house and explained what the order meant. He said his telephone wasn’t particularly good and was thinking of changing it." Mr Criddle said he was told officers would want to have a look before he traded in his phone.
He added: “However on August 9 he sent an email to police saying that he got a new telephone and an iPad and his old one had been destroyed. He said that he had taken a hammer to it and smashed it.”
He was interviewed and confirmed he had smashed the phone up and claimed he had done so in front of his probation officer.
Unsworth, a former auxiliary nurse, of Stanley Road, pleaded guilty to breaching the court order.
His barrister Olivia Beasley said Unsworth was still subject to the three year community order and pointed out that he is unfit to carry out unpaid work.
The judge Recorder Ian Harris said he had his doubts about his claim of smashing the phone in front of his probation officer.
Mr Harris said: “It seems to me that you lied about how you destroyed it having said it was in the presence of a probation officer when it wasn’t.
“It was a flagrant breach of the Sexual Harm Prevention Order which carries a maximum sentence of five years imprisonment.”
He warned him that he was “merely a step away” from a custodial sentence but accepted he had been working well with the probation service in terms of rehabilitation and an immediate jail term would interrupt that good work.
He imposed a two month curfew with an electronic tag between 10pm - 7am to limit his liberty and ordered him to pay £150 prosecution costs.
Recorder Harris also warned him that he would be “in peril” if he breached the community order or the SHPO in future.
