A man pretended to be a 17-year-old and engaged in sexual conversations with children, asking one of them to masturbate for him on Snapchat, a court heard. Marc Wallis, 29, was sentenced at Cardiff Crown Court on Tuesday after pleading guilty to three counts of possession of indecent images, one count of sexual communication with someone under the age of 16, and two accounts of attempting to incite a 13-year-old girl to engage in sexual activity.
The court heard that a police search warrant found mobile phone conversations between Wallis and children, some of whom were undercover police officers. The defendant had pretended to be 17 years old and prosecutor Emma Harris noted "the conversation turned sexual very quickly". Indecent images were also discovered involving some children as young as seven.
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Wallis, of King Street, Cwm, Ebbw Vale, told police he had said "stupid things" to the children he was chatting with in order to see their reaction and wanted to see "how far he could push the conversation" with one of the individuals. Defence barrister Kevin Seal, mitigating, said: “There is no attempt at any distribution of the material and no attempt to meet any of the children he spoke to.” He added that Wallis had "few friends" and had no employment since losing his job as a result of an industrial accident.
Mr Seal said: "H e is a man with no previous convictions. This might be one of those cases where Mr Wallis and society would benefit from him doing the Horizon course." Recorder Greg Bull KC noted the seriousness of the offences and that the sentencing guidelines would suggest Wallis should be sent to prison for 20 months. However he acknowledged that some of the children were in fact decoys and said he believed Wallis could be rehabilitated and "be made to think positively about sex and your current preoccupation with children".
Recorder Bull made Wallis subject to a community order of 36 months and he will be on the sex offenders register for five years. The defendant must also complete a Horizon Project course and complete 15 days of rehabilitation and 200 hours community work. He must also pay £400 for the cost of the prosecution.
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