A pensioner who sexually abused two young boys more than 30 years ago was told that he may die in jail.
A judge sentenced 70-year-old William Dixon to a total of 21 years in prison after he was convicted following a re-trial of serious sexual abuse of the youngsters on Friday.
Liverpool Crown Court heard that Dixon, a former Bootle man, is awaiting operations and Recorder Ian Unsworth, QC, told him because of the length of sentence and his poor health “it may mean you will never come out.”
READ MORE: We tried these petrol stations today and they were all out of fuel
Dixon - who has served six years for raping another boy - had brazenly denied all the allegations at both his earlier trial and re-trial but the judge pointed out that now in his pre-sentence report he largely admits what he had done.
The judge said: “Your approach to these proceedings was, as it was to the young men, one of utter contempt.”
Impact statements from the two victims - who were aged between four and 13 - revealed significant psychological harm that has led them into substance mis-use and crime in later years.
Recorder Unsworth said: “Whatever difficulties they have had in life I have no doubt was caused in large part by your actions which were thoroughly evil."
After Dixon was released from the rape sentence he received in 1997 he re-located down South and now lives in Brock Gardens, Reading.
Sarah Holt, prosecuting, read powerful impact statements today from the two victims, with one present in the public gallery.
In his statement he said how he had had an idyllic childhood until he was eight-years-old but the events then occurred “have affected the course of my life for ever.”
He said that feelings of guilt, shame, worthlessness and low self-esteem had followed him into adulthood and he developed a life long addiction to drugs and alcohol funded by petty crime.
It was only while speaking to a doctor he met at the Lighthouse Project that he found the courage to reveal what had happened to him.
The other victim said his childhood had been taken away from him and he turned to drugs at an early age and had struggled ever since with his mental health.
He said: “All down to my my childhood and him taking my soul away….it has scarred me for life.
"What he has done to me is unforgivable.”
He concluded, “How I am going to get through life I don’t know. I have support but nothing is working.”
Michelle Clarke, defending, said: “He obviously had a fully contested re-trial after a trial.
"He now appears to have accepted the verdicts of the jury and that he was responsible for what he was convicted of.”
He himself had been abused as a child “but that does not excuse his behaviour,” she said.
She said that he had been in denial and had convinced himself it did not happen.
He was realistic about the lengthy sentence he would receive and knew with his current state of health, which means daily pain, he may never come out.
Recorder Unsworth said that the offences spanned six years and involved grooming behaviour and multiple incidents of abuse moving from one boy to the other
He added: ”All of which was to fulfil your own sexual needs and gratification.
“You have caused your victims untold damage.
“They presented as two very brave young men who have had the courage, not withstanding all they had to endure all their lives because of you, to report this matter to the police and have had the courage to support each other.”
Recorder Unsworth pointed out that he had forced the victims to twice give evidence before a jury but now in the pre-sentence report largely accepts the offences and said “it reveals in the starkest way your utter lack of remorse.”
Dixon had been convicted of indecency with one boy and indecently assaulting him and seven offences of indecent assault against the other boy, one of buggery and two offences of attempted buggery.
The judge ordered him to sign the Sex Offenders Register for life and imposed an indefinite Sexual Harm Prevention Order.
Dixon, who appeared via video link from prison, sat resting his chin on his hand when sentenced and the one victim in the public gallery hugged his woman companion.
Receive newsletters with the latest news, sport and what's on updates from the Liverpool ECHO by signing up here.
