Leighton Lewis 32

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A SEX offender who was challenged by a woman after he walked into a house he was banned from reacted angrily, spitting into her face. 

The violent behaviour on January 9 of 32-year-old Carlisle man Leighton Lewis and his decision to flout his sexual harm prevention order led to his arrest and a remand in custody, the city’s crown court heard.

The defendant, of Lediard Avenue, Carlisle, admitted two breaches of his sexual harm prevention order, a common assault, and the theft of a mobile phone.

Prosecutor Matthew Hopkins outlined the offending.

He explained that Lewis was given the sexual harm prevention order in June of 2024 after he was convicted of attempting to cause a child to engage in sexual activity.

The defendant was charged after he fell for an online sting, sending lewd sexual images to a person he believed to be a 13-year-old girl. She was actually an adult decoy, working for a paedophile hunter group.

Lewis later blamed his sordid behaviour on being “off his head” on cocaine.

Mr Hopkins described how Lewis agreed to meet a woman for a meal in Workington on January 8, and at the end of the evening he was drunk. Going into the property from which he was banned, he challenged a woman who was there.

He verbally abused her, prompting the woman to tell him to leave and point out that his presence at the property was a breach of his sexual harm prevention order because there were children in the house.

“The defendant ignored this and said he would hit her,” said Mr Hopkins. Lewis then pinned the woman on to the sofa, straddled her with his knees, and spat in her face.

When she then tried to call the police, he grabbed her mobile phone, and asked her: “Do you think I’m scared?” As he left the property, Lewis took another phone that was in the property and left with it.

He returned to the address at 2am, banging on the door and again being verbally abusive.

When police arrested the defendant at his home in Carlisle, they found he had a tablet device which he had not declared to the police, as required by his court order.

Marion Weir, defending, said Lewis had felt as though the woman had interfered with his personal life, though he accepted this did not give him the right to behave as he had.

He had spent the equivalent of a 12-month sentence on remand.

Referring to the undeclared tablet, Miss Weir said it was given to Lewis by his father and not declaring it was an “oversight.”

“There was nothing untoward found on the tablet,” she added.

Judge Michael Fanning pointed out that the failure to declare the tablet was a serious offence because it meant police were unable to fit it with monitoring software and keep track of what it was being used for.

The judge then referred to the assault: “You straddled her and spat in her face, one of the worst forms of common assault,” said Judge Fanning, adding that this was the "most gross form of common assault.

The offending had to be marked be marked by custody. He jailed the defendant for 18 months.