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This pensioner twice contacted who he believed were 13-year-old girls online and engaged in explicit sexual chat with them. Derby Crown Court heard how Bryan Eaglefield told the first one he would like to kiss, cuddle and shower with her.
After being arrested and while under investigation for that offence he carried out the same perverted act with a second underage teen. But on both occasions, Summer and Olivia were actually undercover police officers.
Lesley Pidock, defending the 67-year-old father-of-two, said: He has worked all of his life in factories and was made redundant. He then began working in a care home until he retired three years ago which coincided with the national lockdown in 2020.
That was set against unhappy domestic circumstances where his marriage of the last 11 years had failed and he found himself locked in struggling with loneliness, social isolation and a failed marriage. Any friends they had were joint friends and he lost them during the split from his wife.
That is the best he can do to explain what led him into this position. He has behaved appallingly and he is incredibly ashamed. He has lost contact with everyone in his life apart from his two daughters as a result of his actions.
He now lives entirely on his own. Sam Lowne, prosecuting, said the first offence took place in February 2021.
He said an identity called Derbys M linked to Eaglefield began chatting to 13-year-old Summer online and that the conversation quickly moved to sexualised chat.
The prosecutor said: Summer was really an LEO, or law enforcement officer and the defendant started telling her her pyjamas were sexy, that he wanted pictures of her and that he would like them to kiss, cuddle and shower together and asked her what was under her dressing gown.
A warrant was executed at his then address, he was there with his wife and he was arrested and his devices were seized and analysed. He told officers I have been talking to young girls and on one Nokia phone were two indecent images.
In an interview he said it was friendly banter. Mr Lowne said while under investigation for that, in November 2022, Eaglefield, of Heanor, began talking online to Olivia, another 13-year-old girl.
He said during those chats he told her how he would like to kiss and cuddle her and shared an image of himself to her. The defendant, of Cromford Close, pleaded guilty to two counts of attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child and two counts of making indecent images of a child.
He has no previous convictions or cautions of any kind. Handing him a 14-month jail sentence, suspended for 18 months, Judge Shaun Smith KC said: I have absolutely no doubt, in your loneliness, you moved from looking at adult sites, which is not an offence, and then got yourself involved with children, which is.
The problem here is that having been detected and spoken to by the police, you did it again and that makes it a lot more serious.
As part of the suspended sentence order, Judge Smith ordered Eaglefield to attend a 45-day sex offender treatment programme and to attend 55 rehabilitation sessions. He placed him on the sex offender register for 10 years and handed him a sexual harm prevention order, also for 10 years. The defendant was also ordered to pay 400 towards the prosecution costs.