Voyeur filmed women in changing rooms - suspended sentence

[DomesticatedZombie]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-59399309

"He's gone from putting cameras in a bag on the beach, with people sunbathing... to then going extreme into filming in leisure facilities and finally hacking into people's computers."

...

"He changed his real name by deed poll before he was officially charged so he could protect his privacy.

He was able to use his new name and so protect his identity throughout the court case, from being charged to sentencing, giving him the luxury to remain "unknown"."

This is clearly a man who went to enormous lengths to spy on women - a huge number of women - over the course of an extended period of time.

Victims called his sentence 'unduly lenient' . (He got a 2 year suspended sentence and is on the SRO).

The woman quoted here is asking for voyeurism to be included on the Unduly Lenient Sentence scheme.

'The Unduly Lenient Sentence scheme, under which people can appeal a sentence, has been expanded six times and includes many serious sexual offences.

Most recently, sexual offences involving an abuse of trust, indecent images offences and domestic abuse offences were added, however voyeurism is not currently included within its scope.'

That " sentence " is pathetic. He's gotten away with it.

Anyone who ever says " just go to the police" surely must see by now there's no point. That the system is designed by men fir men to get away with almost all sexual offences towards women.

Its barbaric. She was probably better off not knowing tbh. Now she will live forever in a self imposed prison while he carries on a free man.

Jesus christ. Nearly 170 victims and he gets a suspended sentence.

Such a lenient sentence it is sickening. We have women serving prison sentences for TV licence evasion.

This man was reported as having a history of mental health issues. Yet he was astute enough to change his name to avail of anonymity in reporting. So wrong.

I'm going to forward this article to my MP and ask for her comment. If enough of us do this, surely we can raise a stink. His cunning and forethought are very worrying. Now he's got away with this, what will he think he can get away with next?

So that bastard gets to keep his privacy even though he violated the privacy of 170+ women?

It is outrageous. Isn’t there a requirement to use a new name (changed by deed poll) in all aspects of life? Otherwise, it is just a joke!

I hope that the name on the SRO will be his new name.

Agree 2 yrs max in the sentencing guidelines is unduly lenient and needs revisiting, but....

And I'm probably going to be flamed for this

A suspended sentence where he will have rigorous conditions, intensive rehabilitation hammering down on him how wrong his actions were and the threat over his head that if he doesn't comply he will go to prison. Plus a 10 year Sexual Harm prevention order where he will have his devices checked regularly, be rigorously monitored and face up to 5yrs custody if he breaches it is more likely to stop him offending than a short prison sentence, locked up with like minded sex offenders who will validate his beliefs making him more likely to reoffend on release, be more skilled at being able to hide his offending and little or no rehabilitation.

Shit for the victim, but I think the judgement to suspend was right in this case and she may have felt better if she'd felt able to go to court as judges are usually very sympathetic and good at explaining to victims.

Wouldn't you think in the interests of public safety that his mug shot should be published? He changed his name and acquaintances who knew him under his previous name could be completely in the dark. Why is it that some criminals get rightly shamed in print but others don't.

A suspended sentence where he will have rigorous conditions, intensive rehabilitation hammering down on him how wrong his actions were and the threat over his head that if he doesn't comply he will go to prison. Plus a 10 year Sexual Harm prevention order where he will have his devices checked regularly, be rigorously monitored and face up to 5yrs custody if he breaches it is more likely to stop him offending than a short prison sentence, locked up with like minded sex offenders who will validate his beliefs making him more likely to reoffend on release, be more skilled at being able to hide his offending and little or no rehabilitation.

I wish this explanation was much more widely known and frequently explained to Joe Public particularly in the scandal rag type newspapers.

The problem is that the public take away from 'suspended sentence' is 'he got away with it' and there is an undeniable increase in these crimes as male people are getting steadily more confident that offending against females comes fairly consequence free. Most serious sex offenders are male and most show a steady escalation in their history through severity of crime as their confidence builds that they are getting away with it.

If I were confident that the active monitoring is as above, I would find that comforting.

However, I find the discussion about the Register difficult because of the threads on FWR about how straightforward it is to persuade some police forces to remove it (iirc, West Yorks is particularly obliging along with areas of Wales). And that's aside from the issue of name changing.

site:mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights register sex offenders remove name

It's up to you, Mishy but I'd recommend that you ask for withdrawal of your transphobic comment. You might be in some jeopardy of it being screenshotted and used in a manner other than you intended on other sites.

Or in a manner they did intend

odd comment, Mishy. Why do you feel the need to bring trans people into this discussion?

All good points, andweallsingalong, and Artichokeleaves. The ultimate best outcome is to stop these crimes from happening at all - I appreciate this is a far more complex question than sentence length. I note the man involved was a heavy porn user.

Yeah, I have to kind of agree with the poster above, I'm not convinced that jail is actually a real solution. It seems worse but it's not at all clear that it creates a better outcome in the end, and it can have an element of "lets just make this look harsh to satisfy people's sense of revenge." It's also a significant expense and the more people that get thrown in jail the less there is available to try other things that may be more effective.

Can anyone else see Mishy's post in grey with a ❕in a circle next to it?

Why not both? Prison for punishment, plus the Sexual Harm prevention order?

Yes, I can, WhiteFire. Bit odd, no?

I posted it on Site Stuff.

Yes, I see that too - although the "!" looks more like an "i" to me.

Because prisons are usually overcrowded and under resourced, with 23 hours per day in a cell during covid (not sure if this has lifted) giving very little time or access to skilled staff to carry our rehabilitative work.

Add in that sex offenders all tend to be housed together to limit the risk of violence from other prisoners so spend 24 hours a day with like minded people (cell mate(s) and others on the wing) validating their behaviours and discussing potential for more serious offending / avoiding detection....

Prison just isn't the deterrent people imagine in some cases, either. In some instances, yes, but for things like this, I tend to think not so much - people who do this stuff are lacking in terms of anticipating outcomes or in self-control, so the prospect of prison doesn't stop them.

And it's not like they are actually out of public circulation for a long time. It's not that protective.

That's scandalous, especially the DBS loophole, but different to this guys 10 year Sexual Harm Prevention Order.

A SHPO is a court order with set conditions with no discretion for the police to remove. Rigorously monitored by specially trained (MOSOVO) police officers who will do regular visits and searches of his accommodation.

The order will state :-
*. Where he needs to live

• restrictions on devices and social media with conditions not to delete and have available for inspection
• might have exclusion zones
• might have no contact or no unsupervised contact conditions
• might have to wear a buddy tag with real time GPS tracking

And that's in addition to signing the sex offenders register and his suspended sentence order with mandatory intensive rehabilitation.

There are never any guarantees someone won't reoffend, but this guy will be rigorously supervised and challenged on his behaviour.

I'm feeling slightly more reassured. I think it's that the cases that stick in my mind are ones like this where it seemed quite straightforward for someone to breach an SHPO.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4218934-Transitioning-child-rapist-who-breached-order-spared-jail-over-prison-safety-concerns

That said, despite the numbers of such breaches recorded here (of a subgroup rather than the general class of SHPO), I have to say that I don't know the denominator so I don't know if it is a very small number of people who go on to violate an SHPO or (say) 10% or so of all those who are subject to them.

transcrimeuk.com/category/sexual-offences/breaching-sopo/