Latest Offenders Exeter

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An amateur photographer has been jailed for paying a 14-year-old girl to pose naked for him and then posting one of the images online.

Retired Met police officer Andrew Vernon’s actions left the girl with serious psychological issues including thoughts of suicide and it took her three years before she was able to confide in a school counsellor.

Police found a hoard of other images of teenaged girls on his laptop after his arrest which he had downloaded from the internet.

Officers also recovered images from an ammunition safe at his former home in East Devon of an adult woman in a shower which he had filmed secretly.

The two victims wrote powerful impact statements. The girl said she is being treated for severe depression and has psychological scars which she will take to the grave.

She said: “It has broken me in so many ways, I have a sense of feeling shattered.” The adult victim said she felt betrayed.

Former Metropolitan Police officer Vernon, aged 59, now of Maple Road, Exeter, admitted taking and distributing indecent images of the 14-year-old, two counts of making (by downloading), indecent images of children and one of voyeurism.

He was jailed for 18 months by Judge David Evans at Exeter Crown Court and ordered to sign on the sex offenders’ register. The judge adjourned an application for a sexual harm prevention order.

He told him: “You admitted these offences after trying to minimise your sexual interest in teenaged girls. You got a 14-year-old girl into posing for you and manoeuvred her into doing that. The problems that you caused have been set out in her personal statement.

“That offence is very significantly aggravated by the distribution of an image online. The constellation of offences makes the case too serious for this sentence to be suspended.”

Mr Greg Richardson, prosecuting, said the teenaged girl made disclosures at school last year about having posed for the naked pictures three years earlier when she was 14.

She revealed that Vernon paid her £75 for a 30 minute photo shoot in which he got her to pose topless and then fully naked, and pose with her arms above her head and her hands running through her hair.

He showed her a blank SD card shortly afterwards and told her he had deleted everything but he downloaded them onto his laptop and sent one to an amateur photographic website.

Police recovered a total of 441 images from his laptop and USB and SD cards hidden in an ammunition safe. There was only one showing an adult having sex with a child.

Mr Matthew Graham, defending, said Vernon wants to apologise for the hurt he has caused. He has signed up for an online course run by the Lucy Faithfull Foundation to address his behaviour and is receiving counselling.

He said Vernon is very keen to attend courses run by the probation service which could only be offered if he was still at liberty. He has no previous convictions and has been volunteering at a charity in Exeter.

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A North Wales sex offender who went off the polices radar because he was afraid of being targeted by vigilantes has been jailed.

Maurice Ferriter was living rough in Exeter and believed he would be attacked if other street sleepers learned that he had previously been jailed for sexually assaulting a barmaid at a Flintshire pub.

He was supposed to sign on every week but failed to do so and remained at large for three months before he was arrested.

He has a long history of failing to comply with the terms of the registration scheme, which is designed to enable the police to keep track of sex offenders.

Homeless Ferriter, aged 49, admitted his ninth breach of registration conditions and was jailed for a year by Recorder Mr Christopher Quinlan, QC.

Exeter Crown Court heard that Ferriter was jailed for 24 weeks for an identical offence in April 2021 and released at the half way point in August.

He signed on at a police station in Plymouth for two weeks but then failed to do so again until he was arrested in Exeter in October. He has been remanded in custody ever since.

Mr Jason Beal, defending, said Ferriter failed to register because he feared for his safety. He said: He was living on the streets and believed if he went to register at Exeter police station, the nature of his convictions would become known and he would be in danger.

Ferriter was ordered to sign on the register for life after being found guilty of sexually assaulting a barmaid at a pub in Flintshire, in 2012 and jailed for three and a half years.

Ferriter, aged 47, moved to Devon after his release from that sentence and has failed to register repeatedly over the ensuing seven years.

Description

A Devon man has been jailed for sexually assaulting and attempting to rape a woman.

Marc Minchington, 39, denied the offences but was found guilty at a trial in December.

He returned to Exeter Crown Court on Monday [March 14] to be sentenced to eight years in prison.

The court was told he suffered 'some kind of mental meltdown' at the time of the offence.

He still denies doing anything wrong or that he was experiencing a mental health episode at the time. 

Recorder Don Tait said: "In December last year you were convicted by a jury of all these offences. Their decision in relation to each of the charges was unanimous. Because you contested the matter there is no such reduction I can make to your sentence.

"Even now you're in denial and have been for many years. I sat and listened to the evidence and recall it was quite clear that something happened at the time of these offences in your mind.

"You have been a hard-working man and have never really been in any trouble before. From the evidence you were significantly mentally unwell. You didn't accept that and you don't now.

"It is quite clear you were drinking far too much and that didn't help your mental health when you committed these offences."

Minchington, of Dart Walk, Exeter, will serve half of his sentence in jail and the rest on licence. He was told the sign the sex offender's register.

Description

Police seized his computers and found he had been searching the internet for depraved videos and images showing the sexual abuse of girls, some as young as three years old

Facebook helped police track down an Exmouth paedophile who downloaded images of child sex abuse.

The internet giant reported suspicious activity on the account of Neil Rhodes and Devon and Cornwall Police arrested him.

They seized his computers and found he had been searching the internet for depraved videos and images showing the sexual abuse of girls, some as young as three years old.

They also uncovered an online chat relationship he was having with a teenage girl in which he persuaded her to send him naked photos of herself.

Exeter Crown Court was told the girl broke off contact when she discovered he had been lying to her and was in a steady relationship with a woman his own age.

The 34-year-old, of Chamberlain Road, was spared jail and given a 12-month suspended sentence for two offences.

He admitted making indecent photos of children and engaging in sexual communication with a child.

Prosecutor Mr Garth Richardson said a referral was made to police by Facebook about indecent images of children from the internet that could be traced to the defendant's IP address.

Police searched his home address on April 30, 2019 and seized several devices. Indecent images were found on a number of machines. They included the rape and abuse of children by adults in the most serious category.

The age range of the child victims was between three and 15.

Analysis of search terms used on the devices showed Rhodes had a sexual interest in children. One photo album on his phone had been disguised as a calculator app.

Messages showed Rhodes had been in communication with a girl since she was 14. They had never met but used Snapchat, WhatsApp, Facetime and texts to stay in touch until she was 19.

They shared sexual images of one another.

The girl said in a statement he would ask her for sexual images and videos in every conversation. She considered the pair to be in a relationship and said she had not been forced into anything.

But she had been vulnerable when he first contacted her. He had appeared caring but she realised by the end 'all he wanted was sexual photos and videos'.

Mr Warren Robinson, in mitigation, said the offences had happened some time ago and Rhodes had referred himself to organisations who could help him understand his behaviour.

Judge Timothy Rose said his actions had been 'profoundly disturbing' but he accepted Rhodes now understood that and was sorry.

"It took place over a three year period and over the same period of time you commenced some form of online relationship with a real person came to know," said the judge.

"You were twice her age and should never have been doing it in the first place."

Rhodes was jailed for 12 months, suspended for two years. He must sign the sex offender register for 10 years and was made subject to a Sexual Harm Prevention Order restricting his use of the internet for the same period.

He must do the Horizon sex offender programme for 40 days and 30 days rehabilitation with probation.

Description

A rugby club treasurer has been jailed for sexually assaulting a woman after giving her a lift home from a party.

Accountant and Torrington Rugby Club treasurer Robert North, 45, molested the woman as she slept in the back of his car.

She woke to find him with his hands up her dress.

North stood trial at Exeter Crown Court in November and was convicted by a jury of assault by penetration. He returned to court on Friday (January 21) and was put away for four-and-a-half years.

Judge Anna Richardson said: "You took the opportunity to callously seek sexual gratification as she was lying on the back seat of the car."

After the sentence, police praised the bravery of the victim for coming forward and showing patience through the long court process.

The case dated back to 2020.

The trial heard North offered the woman a lift home and she fell asleep on the way.

The defendant, of Linden Close, said he was just trying to help the unresponsive woman from the back seat of the car.

Mr Richard Crabb, defending, says he still denies doing anything wrong.

He said North was a man of previous good character whose marriage had broken down shortly before the incident.

The offence had been 'opportunistic' rather than pre-planned, he added.

The victim said in a statement that she still suffers nightmares about the assault and ongoing trauma.

She said: "I am angry about what happened to me. I want him to know what he has done and I want to know why he did it."

Judge Richardson said: "Her trauma continues. She was particularly vulnerable as she was asleep."

After the case Detective Constable Cartwright of Barnstaple CID said: "Todays outcome could not have been possible without the bravery and courage of the victim for staying with us throughout the long court process.

"I hope that this may help other survivors of sexual assault by giving them the confidence to come forward and report such crimes to the police."

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A paedophile has been jailed for deliberately deleting the internet search history on his laptop.

Justin Sanders, 26, who is also known as Justin Washington, installed an app on the machine designed to clean it of evidence, Exeter Crown Court heard.

Sanders is a convicted sex offender who was subject to a court order banning him from deleting his internet search history.

But when police checked up on him last year they found child abuse images on his phone.

They also discovered he had installed CCleaner software on his laptop and used it to delete evidence of what he had been looking at during lockdown.

He told a judge that he had only deleted cookies, temporary files and caches to make his computer work better but the judge said the evidence pointed to him deleting indecent images of children.

Recorder Don Tait said: "He was deliberately and knowingly deleting incriminating and significant evidence from his laptop."

Sanders was jailed for two years.

The defendant, of Howell Road, Exeter, admitted two offences of having indecent images of children on his phone. He also admitted breaching the terms of his Sexual Harm Prevention Order imposed in 2016.

Mr Brian Fitzherbert, prosecuting, said police could not find evidence of exactly what images Sanders had deleted from this laptop. But they found a conversation Sanders had on Facebook with another sex offender in which they shared enthusiastic paedophilic opinions on a child anime character.

The defendant has previous convictions for possessing indecent images of children and for sexual offences against boys.

Ms Emily Pitts, defending, said Sanders knew he had breached the terms of his SHPO by deleting cookies with CCleaner but said his police offender manager had told him he had permission to do so.

He was someone who needed help for his behaviour and would not get that in prison, she said.

"Custody is a damaging environment for him," she added. "It is not going to address his longer term issues. Custody is not going to help him and not going to help the public or protect the public.

"What is needed is structure and tailored intervention."

Description

Convicted Exeter sex attacker Luke Prato - who drag a terrified woman into a park while telling her he intended to have sex with her - has been found dead in his prison cell.

The 25-year-old, who had a history of random acts of violence against strangers, was jailed for four years in March 2020, with a two year extended licence and was classified as a dangerous offender.

Mr Prato, of Grendon Road, had been transferred from Exeter Prison to HMP Isle of Wight, where he died on November 27.

It is believed he was awaiting a transfer to Broadmoor Secure Hospital due to his mental health. An inquest will be held into his death at a later date.

A prison service spokesperson said: “HMP Isle of Wight prisoner Luke Prato died on November 27. The Prisons and Probation Ombudsman has been informed.”

Mr Prato was described as 'every young woman's worst nightmare' at Exeter Crown Court last year. He was convicted of sexual assault on the woman and causing actual bodily harm to her male friend at a trial in January 2020.

He had tried to 'chat up' the 21-year-old victim on the dance floor of Exeter's Angel pub earlier in the evening but she told him to leave her alone.

He saw her walking home with a friend a couple of hours later and shadowed them through the streets of the city before attacking them both at the entrance to Belmont Park at 3am.

He set on the man first and once he had backed off he launched a sexual attack. He told the terrified victim, 'I want you right now', and said he was going to have sex with her in the park as he thrust his hand up her skirt and groped her.

He grabbed her around the throat and tried to drag her into the park and fought off her friend when he tried to stop him, knocking him to the ground so violently he suffered a gash to his head.

The woman managed to escape and run across the road to try to seek refuge in a house but in the time it took for her to wake the owner, Prato followed her and attacked her again.

He was trying to drag her back towards the park with his hands around her throat when the householder opened her door and rushed out to rescue her.

He fled the scene before police arrived but they tracked him down to his bedsit nearby. Forensic evidence and CCTV from the Angel showed he was the attacker. More footage showed him shadowing the victim from Sidwell Street to the park.

Mr Prato told police initially he was not the attacker but changed his story in court and said he was attacked by the two victims.

The court heard Mr Prato refused all psychiatric help despite being diagnosed with an anti-social personality disorder.

Joss Ticehurst, defending, said Mr Prato had been cleared of the more serious counts of attempted rape and assault with intent to commit a sexual offence.

He added Mr Prato had issues with his mental health arising from a traumatic childhood that included finding his mother hanging inside the family home when she committed suicide. He described him as highly intelligent but unbalanced.

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An already convicted sex offender from Exeter has avoided a prison sentence after he was caught with hundreds of child sexual images including many showing the rape or torture of young children

Robert Graham Barter, 37 of Stemson Avenue, Pinhoe, Exeter appeared at Exeter Crown Court where he pleaded guilty to possessing indecent images of children and for breaching a previous sexual offences prevention order dating back to 2011

The court was told that Barter had collected the images of over a five year period.

Police analysed the images and found 101 images in category A, 677 images in category B, and 274 images in category C.

Barter was also convicted of a sexual offence in 2011

The judge handed Barter a 32 week prison sentence which was suspended for two years.

He was placed under a curfew for four weeks and a sexual Harm Prevention Order, including prohibition against using any device capable of accessing the internet was also imposed.

Barter is also required to register as a sex offender for an indefinite period.

Description

A drifter has been jailed for having sex with three under age girls and trying to set up dates with two more.

David Orchard, who is also known as Withyman, was sofa surfing or living in his car when he met the girls, aged 13, 14 and 15.

He had a five month relationship with a 14-year-old schoolgirl in Exeter during which they had unprotected sex in his car four times.

He was caught because he started walking her to school and teachers became worried about his contact with her.

Orchard moved to Exeter while he was being investigated for having sex with two under age girls in Sheffield.

He defied a police notice to stay away from a 15-year-old girl and persuaded her to have sex with him at a friend’s house.

Just weeks later, he invited two 13-year-olds to his sister’s house in Sheffield to watch a film and got one of them to give him oral sex.

Police found social media messages with two more girls on his phone. He suggested sex with both and boasted about the size of his penis to the 13-year-old, writing ‘you could not get any bigger’.

Orchard, aged 23, of no fixed address, admitted two counts of sexual activity with a child and two of sexual communications with a child.

He denied a further count of sexual activity with the child in Exeter but was found guilty at a trial in Exeter in January.

He was jailed for five years by Recorder Mr Jonathan Barnes at Exeter Crown Court. He was also put on the sex offenders’ register for life and made subject to a sexual harm prevention order which bans any future contact with under age girls.

He told him:”What you did was very serious. You knew full well you should not have been engaging or attempting to engage in sexual activity with under age girls.

“You were with three separate young girls and two further offences of sexual grooming of two more. I am sure you would have proceeded to commit sexual offences against them if you had the opportunity.

“If you come out of prison and get involved with under aged girls again, you will go to prison for a very long time indeed.”

Mr Richard Crabb, prosecuting, said the first offences were committed in Sheffield in July and August of 2017 with girls aged 15 and 13.

He had been seeing the older girl for some months and had been issued with an abduction order which banned him from contact. He cajoled into having full sex with her.

He met two 13-year-old girls on Facebook and invited them to his sister’s house where he got one of them to masturbate him. He then pushed her head down onto his penis and held it there for about 25 seconds.

He was arrested and interviewed by police and denied meeting the two girls, even after they had picked him out in an identification procedure.

Orchard was released under investigation and moved to Devon in October 2017, living under the name of Withyman and spending some of his time living in his car.

He met the 14-year-old shortly after arriving in Exeter and they had a relationship which included having sex in his car.

Mr Crabb said:”He walked with her to school and must have known how old she was. She developed something of a crush on him and the sex was fully consensual. Her school alerted her mother who called the police.”

Orchard went on to groom two more girls on Facebook, sending a 15-year-old a picture of his penis with lewd messages.

Mr Ed Bailey, defending, said Orchard has learning difficulties which meant that his mental age is much lower than his physical age.

He has been classified as a vulnerable prisoner and has been unable to receive any visits from his family since the Covid lockdown in March.

He said there was no grooming involved in the Exeter case and all the sexual activity had been consensual.

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A dangerous sex offender has been sent back to prison after he was caught trying to chat up teenage girls within months of his release.

Mark Phillips was freed after serving six years of a ten year sentence for having sex with a 14-year-old girl who he threatened with a hunting knife.

Police applied for a Sexual Harm Prevention Order after learning that he was contacting schoolgirls on chatrooms and social media.

He has been jailed after he was caught going shopping in Exeter with a 16-year-old girl, who he also plied with alcohol.

He was declared to be a dangerous offender when he was jailed at Truro Crown Court in 2013 for three offences of penetrative sexual activity with a child.

Those offences involved him starting a sexual relationship with a 14-year-old girl in his home town of Callington when he was 23.

He took her virginity on Valentines Day but became controlling, manipulative and abusive and ended up putting a knife to her throat.

He was released from Dartmoor Prison in April last year and was living in a post-release hostel in Exeter when the police discovered he was trying to contact under-aged girls again.

Officers obtained a Sexual Harm Prevention Order (SHPO) which banned any contact with anyone under 18 either in person or online.

He broke the order five weeks later by messaging the 16-year-old, taking her shopping in John Lewis in Exeter, and buying her a can of alcohol.

Phillips, now aged 30 and of Howell Road, Exeter, admitted two breaches of the SHPO and was jailed for two years by Judge Timothy Rose at Exeter Crown Court.

He told him: You knew exactly what you were doing. You had just been told a few weeks earlier in court not to have any contact with anyone under 18.

You are a dangerous person who has breached this order within a month or so of it being imposed. Your contact with this girl was deliberate and quite manipulative.

Samuel Castlehouse, prosecuting, said the SHPO was imposed on December 5, 2019, because of concerns by Phillipss offender manager about his online activity.

He said: He was found to be accessing porn sites on a daily basis and had contacts on social media and in chatrooms with females whose profiles and messages suggested they were still at school.

He was accessing sites and contacting females on various platforms for the sole purpose of meeting his sexual needs.

His offender manager learned he had been in John Lewis in Exeter with a 16-year-old girl and another sex offender. He bought her a can of alcohol on the same day and exchanged Snapchat messages which he later deleted.

William Parkhill, defending, said Phillips had started a sex offenders treatment programme after his release but it had not had time to affect his attitudes or behaviour.

He said similar work will be needed before he is released again, which may not be until the expiry of his original sentence in 2023.

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A pervert who tried to make two young girls engage in vile sexual acts has been jailed for eight years.

Ikea worker Michael Batty, 44, carried out sickening abuse against youngsters and told them to keep quiet about the attacks.

The offences, which took place in North Yorkshire, didn't come to light until several years later when one of the girls plucked up the courage to tell her mother that Batty "had touched her".

She said: "He just made me do stuff that just wasn't right."

Police approached the other affected girl who initially denied that anything had happened, before telling of the abuse, reports Teeside Live

A statement from one of the victims said: "I hope today you feel the guilt that you made me feel."

"You took away my innocence in a way no one ever should."

"You have no control over me anymore and now everyone will see who you really are."

The court heard in mitigation that a report had concluded that Batty had a high probability of having ADHD and has a below average IQ of 74.

The judge was told he has led a "simple and very blameless life" and "he can't even explain why this happened".

Batty, of Milford Lane, Thorverton, Devon, admitted three counts of sexual assault of a child and five counts of causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity at Teesside Crown Court.

The shelf stacker denied attempting to rape a child and causing a child to watch a sex act, and the prosecution accepted that these charges should lie on file.

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A rapist who manipulated a girl into having sex with him by pretending to be a ghost has been jailed for 26 years.

Liam Clarke knew she was terrified of evil spirits and used that to exploit her, Exeter Crown Court heard.

Clarke, 35, of Crediton, Devon, was convicted of four rapes, three assaults by penetration, sexual activity with a child, and eight counts of indecency or indecent assault.

Judge David Evans said: "Your offending across the years was monstrous."

More stories from Devon

The court heard how Clarke's victim was petrified of the occult following a bad experience during an Ouija board game.

He made strange noises at night which left the 15-year-old girl terrified and pushed notes under her bedroom door claiming to be from the ghost.

Pretending to be the spirit, he then made threats to the teenager and told her the only way of getting rid of the demon was by having sex with him.

Sentencing Clarke, Judge Evans said: "She said she did not want to have sex with you but you threatened her repeatedly.

"You made deliberate use of her deep fear of ghosts and spirits."

Hide and seek

The offences took place between 1997 to 2016 in Torquay, Crediton and in Hampshire.

Clarke was arrested in July last year and found guilty at trial in March.

He also repeatedly abused two young girls in Southampton by putting coins in his underwear and getting them to play hide and seek.

Clarke was put on the sex offenders' register for life and made the subject of a Sexual Harm Prevention Order, which restricts his future contact with girls.

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Matthew Clark, a former Topsham barman, has been jailed after being caught with naked images of boys on his phone

A former Topsham barman has been jailed after he was found with images of naked boys on his phone shortly after he completed a sex offenders’ course.

Matthew Clark was sent on the course as part of suspended sentence imposed when he used an online cloud to share images with fellow paedophiles.

He was found with 34 selfie-style images of naked boys aged 14 to 17 when police from the public protection team carried out a routine check on his iPhone.

Exeter Crown Court heard an app for the gay dating site Grindr was found on Clark’s phone; he said he received the images from a contact he met through the site.

Clark, aged 31, of Union Street, Newton Abbot, and formerly of Popham Close, Tiverton, admitted three offences of possessing indecent images of children and two of breaching the terms of the sex offenders’ register.

He was jailed for a total of 12 months by Judge Graham Cottle, who told Clark: “You undertook the Internet Sex Offenders’ Treatment programme. You obviously did not learn from that programme or learn enough from it.

“You committed identical offences in breach of a suspended sentence. It is unavoidable you must serve some of that sentence.”

Mr Gordon Richings, prosecuting, said Clark received a suspended sentence in September 2013 and was being monitored by the police under a sexual offences prevention order.

An officer visited his home in March 2015 and examined his iPhone where she found a Grindr app and naked images which looked as if they had been taken by men of themselves in mirrors.

The phone was examined and 34 of the images were of boys aged 14 to 17. Clark said they had been sent to him by another man.

Mr Jeffrey Segan, defending, said Clark joined Grindr with the intention of meeting adult males. Its terms of use impose a minimum age of 18 but other customers sent him the images.

Mr Segan said Clark had completed unpaid work, and supervision and had benefited from the treatment course.

He said his reaction to being sent the images was fear for his own future rather than any sexual excitement.

Clark is a former Topsham barman who was caught for the first time by a national police investigation into the use of an online drop box to distribute child abuse images.

He distributed 222 pictures or movies and was found with more than 4,000 more on his own computers.

At that time his own barrister described him as having an addiction to the images.

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A disgraced maths teacher jailed for having phone sex with a 14-year-old former pupil – who later tried to kill herself – sought legal advice on suing her for 'harassment', a hearing was told.

Richard Ariss, 29, was sentenced to a year in prison for abusing the girl earlier this year and has now been banned from the classroom for life.

Ariss taught the girl, referred to only as Pupil A, in Years 7 and 9 at a school in the Plymouth area.

After he left for a job at another school in Torbay, he set up a Facebook page as a teaching tool. It was through this that the girl's parents contacted him to arrange private tuition.

But just before the first lesson, her shocked mother found Ariss had been sexting her daughter and called the police.

Exeter Crown Court heard Ariss told the girl to delete texts and messages he sent on another, private Facebook page and told her to store his number as 'random male'.

Prosecutor Peter Coombe told the court hearing in March: 'Shortly after this came to light she overdosed on paracetamol and her mother found farewell letters to friends, one of which was to the defendant and indicated they had planned to meet.'

His messages encouraged her to perform sex acts on herself and showed that on one occasion he had got her to ring him so he could listen to her.

Mr Coombe said: 'The aggravating features are inciting her to penetrate herself and suggesting she should perform oral sex on him. There was significant planning and he has groomed her over time in gross breach of trust.'

Ariss worked at the victim's school from qualifying in July 2010 to May 2014, when he moved from Combe Martin, North Devon, to Exeter, to start his new job.

In February this year, he admitted three offences of inciting a child to take part in sexual activity in September 2014 and was jailed for a year.

But a report by a misconduct panel revealed that when asked to explain himself to teaching watchdogs Ariss showed little remorse.

'Throughout the various investigations, hearings and the trial, Mr Ariss, for the most part, still seems to be focussing on himself and the impact that his actions have had on him,' the findings stated.

The panel note that in his letter of mitigation dated 7 July 2016 and sent from prison, he states that he had been advised by his barrister and solicitors that, if the situation had been different, he could have sued Pupil A for harassment.

'The panel commented that specifically referring to this point reinforces their view that he has shown very little insight into his actions.'

The misconduct panel agreed with the trial judge that the teacher's actions were 'planned and premeditated' and it was 'a classic case of what is called "grooming"'.

It also noted the judge's remarks that 'had the relationship between Mr Ariss and Pupil A continued, there would have been sexual contact', adding: 'Mr Ariss had a blatant disregard for safeguarding policies that would have been in place at the schools in which he taught and which he would have been aware of.

'Pupil A was a vulnerable 14-year-old student (Mr Ariss was 28 at the time of the relationship).

'Even to the extent that Mr Ariss did not know this before he started tutoring her, this would have become clear to him very shortly thereafter. His actions took advantage of this vulnerability.

'The actions of Mr Ariss clearly had a very significant impact on Pupil A (who was already vulnerable), in that she tried to take her own life shortly after these matters came to a conclusion.'

The girl sobbed as she stood in the witness box at Exeter Crown Court in March when she asked for her abuser to be jailed.

She said: 'I have struggled to sleep, I have self harmed, and taken an overdose. I have struggled with feeling responsible, even though I know it was not my fault.

'I have had trouble at school with people laughing at me behind my back and calling me names. I am scared to walk down corridors because of what everyone is thinking about me.'

Recorder Mr Andrew, QC, told Ariss: 'Your contact with the girl became increasingly intimate and sexualised. You gained her trust and she spoke of things which were worrying her.

'You encouraged her to touch herself sexually and discussed her performing oral sex. These were repeated offences.

'You were intending to meet her and this was only prevented because her mother saw the texts.

'I have no hesitation in concluding that if you had met there would have been sexual contact. Behaving in this way to a former pupil was a gross breach of trust.

'You were 27 and she was 14. Teachers are supposed to protect pupils, not to abuse them. This was planned and premeditated. It was a classic case of what is called grooming.'

Description

A computer engineer has been jailed for two years for distributing indecent images of children in one of the "most serious cases" a judge has heard.

Keith Gibson, 50, of Milford Cottages, Kennford had 2,300 still and moving images on his computer which he then distributed to a paedophile ring.

Exeter Crown Court heard some content included the rape of a three-year-old.

Gibson from Devon admitted 10 offences of making, four of distributing and two of possessing indecent images.

The court heard he formed part of an internet paedophile ring which exchanged child sex fantasies and images in chat rooms with some of those involved posing as children.

'Pre-meditated' behaviour

The victims included babies under six-months-old and two of the movies he distributed showed girls aged about three and 10 being raped.

He was caught through an investigation by the Child Exploitation and Online Protection squad in London, the court heard.

Judge Francis Gilbert QC said: "You did not care if you were talking to adults or children and you fantasised you were talking to children.

"The probation report says your behaviour was pre-meditated, well planned and persistent and that you went to significant lengths to avoid detection, and you had no regard for the children who were being abused.

"In my judgment this is one of the most serious cases of this type I have ever come across."

Gibson ran a computer repair business where police seized equipment and found 1,682 still images and 638 movies of which just under 1,000 were in the most serious category.

Formerly of Milford Cottages, Kennford, Gibson recently moved to River Drive, Cullompton, following flooding at his property over Christmas.