Latest Offenders Harrogate

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A 76-year-old sex offender who continued his crimes immediately after being sentenced for earlier offences has been jailed.

Police found 39 indecent images of girls on Michael Bell’s computer when they visited him on April 10, York Crown Court heard.

Kelly Clarke, prosecuting, said the illegal images had been downloaded between March 18 and April 10.

On March 28, Bell had been given a suspended prison sentence at York Crown Court on condition he did 30 days’ rehabilitative activities and was made subject to a sexual harm prevention order (SHPO) at the same court for having indecent images of children.

Bell, 76, of Firs Crescent, Harrogate, denied  having indecent images and breaching the SHPO. He was convicted at trial at York Magistrates Court which sent him back to York Crown Court for sentence. 

Judge Simon Hickey, who had spared Bell an immediate trip to jail on March 28, locked him up for 14 months.

“I take the view it cannot be suspended due to the recent breach of the suspended sentence order by committing similar offences in a very short period of time,” he said.

The new images included pictures of girls aged between nine and 15 years old.

The 14-month prison sentence included 12 months from the suspended prison sentence and two months for the new offences.

Bell had been remanded in custody for 11 weeks, following his arrest in April.

Daisy Wrigley, for Bell, said the lack of exercise in prison and his health problems, including heart problems, meant that he collapsed from time to time.

Ms Clarke said Bell was convicted of having indecent images of children of all three levels of seriousness in March and given a 15-month prison sentence suspended on condition with conditions.

On April 10, two police officers went to Bell’s address so they could check his internet devices as part of the SHPO order and to remove apps from them that he was not allowed to have under the order.

He showed them a Dell computer with a Dropbox application on it and when they opened it, they saw three sexual images of a girl aged 11 to 13. He told them they had been part of the images for which he was convicted in March.

They seized the computer and a forensic check revealed the 39 illegal images of the least serious category downloaded between March 18 and April 10.

They also found a Plex media player installed in contravention of the SHPO.

Ms Wrigley said Bell hadn’t understood what he could and couldn’t have on his computer. He had downloaded it, thinking he was allowed to do that so he could play videos when he was abroad on holiday and at home.

He now accepted he had a problem and was willing to work on rehabilitating himself.

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A Harrogate man has been jailed after sending explicit sexual images to someone he thought was a 12-year-old child.

Jason Carl Veal, 33, of Harewood Road, thought he was talking to a 12-year-old girl over a social media platform, but he was really talking to an undercover investigator.

In January 2023, Veal sent a friend request to the girl via SnapChat, and began sending explicit sexual videos of adults performing sex acts on themselves and encouraged her to do the same.

At one point he believed the girl was at school and encouraged her to use the toilets to carry out the sex acts.

He was arrested by officers a few weeks later and charged with the following offences to which he pleaded guilty:

• attempting to cause/incite a female child under 13 to engage in sexual activity penetration
• attempt to cause a child under 13 to watch/look at an image of sexual activity
• attempt to engage in sexual communication with a child.

He appeared at York Crown Court on Friday 1 March where he was jailed for 30 months. The court also ordered him to register with the police for an indefinite period and issued him with 10-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order.

Detective Constable Kirsty Sullivan, from our Online Child Abuse Investigation Team, said: Irrespective of who he was really talking to, he clearly believed he was communicating with a 12-year-old and that is of great concern to us. The language he used was disgusting and the images repulsive. The Online Child Abuse Investigation Team works proactively and sometimes covertly to identify those who pose a risk to children."

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A MAN from North Yorkshire who was found guilty of rape and sexual assault against a young girl has been jailed for 16 years.

Harrogate man Carl Darren Briggs, 43, was also given two-year extended period on licence and he has been placed on the Sex Offenders’ Register.

North Yorkshire Police say Briggs’ crimes were reported to them in June 2021 after the victim confided in family members and he was arrested shortly after.

He was the subject of an extensive investigation by North Yorkshire Police, with evidence presented to York Crown Court during a three-day trial.

The jury heard how the victim only realised that Briggs’ actions were wrong after learning about the human body in school.

Prior to the court case, the brave victim said in her victim personal statement: “I no longer feel good about myself, do not like the way I look, or feel nice in anything I wear. I feel different, cannot explain to my friends why I do not want to be around them, or why I cry without anything being said to me.

“I just want to feel happy about myself, and my family to be happy, but it will not be because everything has changed. I have changed since this terrible ordeal, and I feel that I will never be the same person again.”

In her own statement, the victim’s mother describes how she cannot sleep at night, how she lies awake going over and over in her mind about what happened and how she feels like she “missed everything”.

She said: “This is a living nightmare that I will deal with for the rest of my life.”

Led by North Yorkshire Police’s Criminal Investigation Department, evidence was gathered from victim interviews and statements, disclosures made to counsellors, and examination of digital devices.

This work culminated in three charges being brought against Briggs: Two counts of rape of a child under 13 years Sexual assault on a child under 13 years by touching He denied all charges but was found guilty of these offences by a jury and sentenced on Friday (March 1).

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Stuart Witham’s “vast” collection of vile images included sordid videos featuring children as young as five, York Crown Court heard.

Witham, 31, shared images with others in a Whatsapp group.

Prosecutor Brooke Morrison said that Witham was also having debauched video chats on a dark website where he would perform lewd acts in front of women and young girls and encourage them to do the same.

The father-of-two was also active on a private-messenger app on which he “offered to sell quantities of indecent images in exchange for Bitcoin and gift cards”.

He was finally nailed when an undercover police officer joined the Whatsapp group posing as a member and began chatting with Witham who sent him indecent images of youngsters and “bragged” about his vile collection of illicit images.

Police turned up at his home and brought him in for questioning when he owned up immediately to his depraved behaviour.

He was charged with three counts of making indecent images of children, two counts of distributing indecent images and one count of engaging in sexual activity in the presence of a child under 13 years of age.

Witham, of Back Mayfield Terrace, Harrogate, admitted all the offences and appeared for sentence last Thursday.

Ms Morrison told the court: “The defendant was a member of a Whatsapp group in which he and other adults (had sexual discussions about) and shared indecent images of children.”

In June 2021, Witham had a Whatsapp chat with a man he presumed to be another member of the group but who was in fact an undercover officer.

“The defendant shared indecent images with the officer and showed him his collection of material,” added Ms Morrison.

After being trapped by the undercover cop, officers swooped on Witham’s home and seized his internet devices.

Forensic analysis revealed a huge cache of indecent material, namely 32,708 vile photos and videos of children, some of them extremely young.

They included 3,800 images of children rated Category A in their level of seriousness and featuring the sexual abuse of minors.

Ms Morrison said police also found chats in which he offered to sell indecent images of children in exchange for digital currency and gift vouchers.

She said forensic officers also found over 40 videos or “screen-recorded conversations” on the dark website.

“Those recordings show that whenever (Witham) was matched with another male, he quickly skipped onto the next user,” she added.

“As soon as he was paired with an adult woman or child, he would begin (performing a lewd act) on screen.”

Witham would move the camera so that the other user would see him doing the act.

On other occasions, he would message the user urging them to “show themselves” and to perform lewd acts.

In one video chat, Witham performed a sexual act in front of a nine-year-old girl and asked the child to “show (their) body on camera”.

Analysis of his internet search history revealed he had sought out “hidden-camera instructions”.

During police questioning, Witham admitted that he had sought out indecent images of children since he was 12 years of age.

He was charged only with the online offences committed in 2021.

Defence barrister Lucy Brown said that Witham, a working man who was married at the time, had undergone cognitive behavioural therapy and sought help from an offenders’ rehabilitation charity to try to curb his nefarious online behaviour.

She asked judge Simon Hickey to consider suspending the inevitable prison sentence, citing Witham’s “very traumatic” childhood and his deep remorse.

But Mr Hickey said it had to be an immediate jail sentence due to the “vast” number of images found on Witham’s devices.

He said although Witham had led an “industrious life” and had taken steps to reform himself, only an immediate prison sentence could be justified for such behaviour.

Witham was jailed for two years and ordered to sign on the sex-offenders’ register for 10 years.

He was also given a 10-year sexual-harm-prevention order to curb his internet activities and contact with children.

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A serial sex offender has today (Thursday 21 December 2023) been sentenced to 13 years’ imprisonment at York Crown Court for twice subjecting a young girl to indecent assault in Northallerton during the 1990s.

John William Marshall (pictured below), 68, of Fairfax Avenue, Harrogate, was sentenced after being found guilty at a trial held in August.

He has also been made subject to an indefinite Sexual Harm Prevention Order (SHPO).

The bravery of the victim has ensured that Marshall faced justice for his crimes, despite the number of years that have passed.

The victim made contact with North Yorkshire Police in 2019 following publicity surrounding the conviction of Marshall for possession of more than 24,000 indecent images of children, for which he served a custodial sentence and made subject to a SHPO which was due to expire.

Marshall had previously been described publicly by a judge as a “dangerous paedophile”.

The court heard that Marshall had befriended the victim’s family, offering help with their newly acquired computer.

He was subsequently trusted to look after the girl when her parents went shopping.

It was during these times that Marshall sexually assaulted her.

The victim’s parents reported it to police and social services at the time, but no further criminal action was taken due to a series of complications.

Now an adult, the victim’s life had been overshadowed by the thought that she was not believed.

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A sexual predator has been jailed again for sexually assaulting a very young girl at a property in Harrogate.

Steven Anthony Jennings, 52, was already serving a 15-year jail sentence for similar offences against two other girls.

Now he’s been handed a further two years’ prison time for the new offences which pre-dated the old ones, but only came to light relatively recently when the victim went to police more than a decade after they occurred.

Daniel Penman, prosecuting at York Crown Court, said that Jennings, who was in his early 30s at the time, sexually assaulted the girl twice between 2005 and 2007.

The girl said she “froze” but such was her young age she didn’t think anything wrong had occurred at the time. She didn’t report the matters at the time and Jennings “got on with life as normal”.

Mr Penman added:

“It took her until 2019 until she felt able to [tell] her partner about these offences and, through that, felt able to report this to police.”

Jennings, who was living in Harrogate before he was given the 15-year sentence at Teesside Crown Court in 2017, was questioned about the offences at Moorlands Prison in Doncaster in May last year when he was coming to the end of his existing jail term.

He initially denied the allegations but ultimately admitted two counts of sexually assaulting a child under 13 years of age. A third allegation was dropped by the prosecution and allowed to lie on court file.

He appeared for sentence today knowing a consecutive jail sentence was all but inevitable.

‘Lost all innocence’

In a statement read out in court, the victim said Jennings’s “cruel” offences had affected her “mentally, physically and emotionally for years”.

She said her self-esteem and mental health were so badly affected that by her mid-teens she was “ready to die”.

She said she used to “cry myself to sleep every night” following the abuse and that she had “lost all innocence”.

Jennings was jailed in October 2017 for the offences against the two other girls, which occurred between about 2008 and 2011. 

The sentence was imposed after Jennings admitting rape and sexual activity with a child in relation to one of the victims, and one count of indecent assault against the other girl. 

The victims were two pre-teenage girls, who were abused by Jennings when he was in his mid-to-late 30s.

He sexually assaulted one of the girls outdoors while he was in a relationship with a woman, said Mr Penman.

Jennings plied the other victim with alcopops and played games “like truth or dare” with her. He ultimately raped the girl, who was too young to consent to sex, on “numerous occasions”.

Defence barrister Hussain Rukhshanda said Jennings was remorseful for his actions.

Judge Simon Hickey said the sexual abuse of the new victim had had a “horrendous” effect on her and that her impact statement made for “sobering reading”.

He told Jennings: 

“She said that’s a burden she carried from a young age due to your selfish actions.”

Jennings was jailed for two years and placed on the sex-offenders’ register for a further 10 years. 

He was also made subject to a sexual harm prevention order, which will run for an indefinite period, to limit his contact with under-age girls. It also bans him from contacting any of the three victims.