January 2023

Pervert holidaymaker found alone with schoolgirl dodges jail

Sex offender Paul Harrison has broken a court order – after being caught alone with a child.

The 30-year-old is subject to a 10-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order (SHPO) after previously being jailed for 45 months for sexual activity with a child.

But he breached the SHPO by being unsupervised with a child. Now Harrison has been sentenced to eight months in prison, suspended for two years, at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court.

The court heard that Harrison had earlier contacted a police risk assessor to say that he was now in a relationship with a woman who has two children under the age of 16.

Prosecutor Mark Brookes said: “The defendant, his partner and two children attended a holiday home in North Wales between September 2 and 4. His partner had to leave with one of the children, leaving the defendant in control of the other.

There was a two-day period where he was unsupervised. A complaint was made and the defendant was arrested. One of the children was ill. His partner took her back. The defendant should have left with her.”

Harrison, of Chaffinch Drive, Biddulph, pleaded guilty to three charges of breaching the SHPO.

The suspended sentence includes a 32-day rehabilitation activity requirement and 100 hours unpaid work.

Recorder Julian Taylor told Harrison: “You had permission to be where you were. Had your partner been there you would not have been in breach. You should have left when she did.”

Harrison must also pay £460 costs. The SHPO is in place until April 5, 2027 and the defendant remains on the Sex Offenders’ Register.

April 2017

Pervert, 24, groomed a teenage girl on Whatsapp

A pervert who groomed a teenage girl on Whatsapp before luring her to a park for sex on multiple occasions has been jailed.

Paul Harrison, 24, first chatted to his 15-year-old victim on Facebook before swapping numbers with her in 2015.

A court heard he then lured her to parks after dark around ten times over two months where he made her carry out sex acts despite knowing her age.

Police discovered Harrison had also got the girl to send him four indecent images of herself when they arrested him on May 5 last year.

Harrison, of Leek, Staffordshire, admitted five counts of sexual activity with a child and one charge of causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity.

He further admitted possessing indecent images of children and was jailed for three years and nine months at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court.

Harrison was also handed a ten-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order and he was placed on the Sex Offenders’ Register indefinitely.

Judge David Fletcher said: ‘The single reason you went to that area – which was some distance from where you live – time and time again, was simply to satisfy your own sexual urges.

‘There is no suggestion by you that there was a loving, long-term potential relationship.

‘This was you, a much older man, utilising a much younger girl to satisfy your own sexual need.

‘You knew she was 15 from the get-go, yet you continued to do it.’

Prosecutor David Bruce said: ‘Their contact progressed to phone calls and Whatsapp messages.

‘They first met up in Fenton Park. It was clear to the defendant that she was 15. She told him she was 15. There was sexual activity the first time they met.

‘When they met on subsequent occasions he had sex with her.’

The court heard Harrison met the girl in either Fenton Park or Smithpool Park in Stoke-on-Trent and they performed sex acts on ‘seven or eight’ occasions.

Police found four indecent images of of the victim on Harrison’s computer, which had been sent to him from the girl’s phone and uploaded to the computer.