Luke Merry 30

Description

A foot fetishist and serial sex offender breached a court order just a month after being released from prison.

Luke Merry, 30, was jailed for 18 months in 2019 after Leeds Crown Court heard he how he had committed two charges of sexual assault on a child under 13 and one offence of voyeurism at a Vue cinema.

He had also previously been convicted of outraging public decency by sitting under a desk that was being used by a female and performing a sex act and performing a sex act while looking at images of women's feet.

On Tuesday, Sheffield Crown Court heard how Merry, of Lakeside Boulevard, Lakeside, Doncaster, was released from his last sentence in December last year and subject to a Sexual Harm Prevention Order, which he breached in January. Prosecutor Richard Sheldon said it was then that he "disclosed he had a laptop and produced a phone and gaming computer.

"In February 2024, he failed to notify the police with a change of address and accepted a conditional caution and agreed to take a polygraph test. The police visited him to check the internet enabled devices and he handed over a number. He was asked about hard drives as the officers could see them in a drawer."

Officers, the court heard, recorded Merry having 17 internet enabled devices. Only three of those were registered. A phone was also found to have Snapchat on, with a username of lukemerry93 on the application. There was also 366 items - including emails - in a deleted folder on the phone. Merry was prohibited from deleting any internet history.

Cheryl Dudley, mitigating, told the court "a lot of information" had been handed to the court, including a psychiatric report and pre-sentence report. She said the probation service required Merry to have a formal assessment for autism and he had been recalled to prison and then remanded into custody since April this year.

Ms Dudley added: "There is room for rehabilitation and the opportunity for rehabilitation that could be grasped...There are factors that support the conclusion that he has autism." The court heard Merry had admitted failing to comply with notification requirements, breach of a Sexual Harm Prevention Order and deleting internet history.

His Honour Judge Reeds KC jailed Merry for 14 months and told him: "You were not long out of prison when you breached your Sexual Harm Prevention Order and notification requirements.

"You were cautioned in February 2024 about being in breach of those requirements. That was a warning but you nevertheless continued to ignore the requirements of that order. You knew what you must not do. It was written down for you and you did it any way."