May 2023

Paedophile had WhatsApp and Snapchat accounts

A pensioner from Derby with a history of child sex offences has pleaded guilty to another 17 of them.

Lionel Winson admitted trying to contact underage girls over the internet and possessing vile child abuse images.

The 78-year-old also failed to tell the police he was using social media as he was required to do under the terms of an order placed on him for past offending.

In 2009, the Normanton paedophile was jailed for trying to contact a 13-year-old girl who was really a police officer.

Now he faces an anxious month-long wait to find out his fate for his more recent offending.

Handing him bail at Southern Derbyshire Magistrates’ Court on Monday, May 15, the chair of the bench said: “We are sending your case to crown court as the offences are so serious that our powers here at magistrates are insufficient. The crown court needs a recent pre-sentence report and you must report to St Mary’s Wharf police station within three days of today.

“You are aware of the conditions (of your bail) and if you breach any of them you can be brought back to court.” In 2014 Winson, of Douglas Street, was handed a sexual harm prevention order at Derby Crown Court for carrying out similar offences to the ones he this week pleaded guilty to.

Under the terms of the order, he must tell the police who are monitoring him of any social media accounts he has set up along with the relevant passwords. But he failed to do this on accounts including WhatsApp, Kik and Snapchat.

The defendant pleaded guilty to four charges of attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child in relation to four victims.

He also pleaded guilty to charges of breaching a sexual harm prevention order, attempting to breach a sexual harm prevention order, failing to comply with the requirements of the sex offender register and one count of making indecent images of children.

Winson was jailed for three years and three months in 2009 for a 2007 offence of inciting a child to engage in sexual activity and possession of indecent images.

On that occasion, he groomed a girl he believed to be aged 13 but who turned out to be a police officer posing as a young teen and who met him at St Pancras railway station in London.

In 2011 he breached the lifetime order he was handed and he did the same in 2015 when he hid electronic devices he should have told the police about but didn’t at his then address in Sedgefield Green, Mickleover. The defendant will be sentenced at Derby Crown Court on June 19.

July 2015

Mickleover sex offender hid phone and tablet from police

A convicted paedophile has admitted breaching a court order by hiding mobile phones and a tablet computer from police.Lionel Winson, 70, was convicted of possessing indecent images of children in 2007 and was jailed for more than three years in 2009 for inciting a child to engage in sexual activity

Under a sexual offences prevention order imposed on him, he was required to register with the police all devices he owned that could access the web and not to delete his internet history.

Derby Crown Court heard that on August 14, police officers from the dangerous persons management unit made an unannounced visit to Winson’s home in Sedgefield Green, Mickleover.

When the officers asked Winson to hand over all his devices, he gave them a laptop and a mobile phone, which he had previously registered with the police.

Sarah Allen, prosecuting, said: “They were examined and he was asked if he had any other devices capable of accessing the internet. He said he had not.“But then the officers heard a ringing sound from where he was seated and Winson produced a mobile phone from under the cushions.“It had images on – it seemed to be a 17-year-old corresponding with him.”Two more mobile phones and a tablet computer were found at his home. The browsing histories had been deleted on them.He told police he had not initially handed over the devices because he was “nervous and afraid of the repercussions”.“

He told police he had an addiction to looking at sexual material on the internet,” said Miss Allen.“He accepted that he had manually deleted the history.”

The court heard that it was unknown what the deleted material consisted of.Winson admitted breaching a sexual offences prevention order by deleting the internet history on two phones and the tablet and by not registering devices with the police, between February and August last year.

Lauren Sharkey, for Winson, said: “Any devices he now has, the police are fully aware of those devices.

“He is retired, having worked throughout his life – mainly in electrical wholesale.”

Handing Winson a two-year jail sentence suspended for two years, Recorder Robert Egbuna said: “You knew – and I have absolutely no doubt that you knew because of your behaviour when police came – that you were committing criminal acts.

“And you knew when this order was imposed upon you, the purpose of that order was to ensure if you had any devices the police could check on where you were going (on the internet), so you knew if you deleted items from your tablet or phones no-one could find out where you had gone.”During the two year suspension, Winson will be supervised by the probation service.

Recorder Egbuna concluded: “You breach that order once and you will be going to prison for at least two years. Do you understand?”

May 2011

Paedophile is sent back to prison after he used mobile to break internet ban

A CONVICTED paedophile has been sent back to jail after he breached a court order by logging on to the internet.

Lionel Winson was jailed in 2009 for grooming on the internet and intending to have sex with what he believed to be a 13-year-old girl. It was in fact a police officer.

The 66-year-old, formerly of Alvaston but now of Bass Street, Derby, was arrested in the police sting after he travelled to London intending to meet the teenager.

He was jailed for three-and-a-half years, with a three-year extended licence, and given a sexual offences prevention order, which included a ban on using the internet.

Winson was released last May but arrested in August after police discovered he owned a mobile phone with an internet connection and had been logging on to adult pornography sites.

At the latest hearing at Derby Crown Court, Recorder Shaun Smith QC said: “It’s always the quiet ones that seem to go under the radar.”

He said there were reports that Winson had been “the quiet one” in prison and had complied with everything.

Katherine Goddard, in mitigation, said there was no evidence that Winson had been contacting anyone of an inappropriate age.

She said that for Winson, the internet had been a way of “forming relationships of emotional intimacy”.

Ms Goddard said: “He was released last May to a world that was changed in just about every respect in what he had known, with the stigma of sexual offender hanging over him, having lost everything he had worked for all his life, his home and wife and family – with one exception of his sister – and his friends.”

Ms Goddard added: “In many ways he was very lonely and isolated”.

The court heard that police had become involved last August after they were contacted by the hostel where Winson was staying. They were concerned that Winson had two mobile phones.

Winson admitted breaching a sexual offences prevention order.

Recorder Smith said: “The nature of the breach is such that it does not suggest to me you were returning to your ways for which you got the sentence. The police took a very long time with computer experts to find what, if anything, you had hidden on your phone but they couldn’t find anything.”

Handing him an eight-month sentence, he said: “The sexual offences prevention order will be in force for the rest of your life and each time you breach this, it is punishable by up to five years in prison.”