Paedophile secretly filmed women in public toilet and sexually assaulted tourist on Durham city bridge - identifies as trans

[fromorbit]

The thing that never happens has happened AGAIN.

A paedophile who filmed women in public toilets and sexually assaulted a tourist on a bridge has been locked up.

Kurtis Mawson was spotted inside female toilets near the Odeon at Millburngate shopping centre in Durham city. The 22-year-old was inside a closed cubicle and was standing on the toilet looking into the next cubicle.

Durham Crown Court heard how the member of the public who saw him on May 5, 2022 contacted police 10.48am and kept watch until they arrived. They also ushered a group of young women out of the toilets.

Liam OBrien, prosecuting, told the court how Mawson was still inside the toilet cubicle when police arrived and an officer asked if anybody was in there. In an attempt to conceal his identity, Mawson put on a high pitched voice and answering "Yeah".

The prosecutor said one of the officers climbed on top of a toilet to continue a conversation with him. He said: "When challenged with what he is doing in a women's toilet he said: 'Just chilling'. He then said he was there as he identified as female."

When police arrested him, they found him in possession of a mobile phone and a digital camera. He had recorded material of women using the toilet.

Mr OBrien told the court: "One of the officers expressed at one stage 'What's wrong with you?'. The defendant answered 'There is something wrong with me, I need help'.

Mawson told police he had purchased a mini camera specifically for recording women and had hidden inside a toilet cubicle until someone entered the stall next to him so he could film them.

The court in Durham heard how Mawson's home was searched and and a number of digital devices, including a computer and it's hard drive, were seized. They were found to contain indecent images of children.

A further computer device was then seized from Mawson, which contained more indecent images of children.

Mr OBrien said there were 80 category category A images - the most serious - as well as category B and C images. There was also an extreme pornographic image of a person engaging in an act with a dog.

In June last year, while on police bail, Mawson committed a sex act next to a tourist who was taking a picture of Durham Cathedral from a bridge in Durham. During the act, he subjected the woman to a sexual assault.

Mr OBrien said: "She was incredibly distressed. She didn't know what to with herself. She asked a number of passers by for help."

In a victim impact statement, which Mr OBrien read to the court, the woman said: "This was my first time visiting Durham. I was excited to see the cathedral. But this incident has made me feel shocked and speechless."

She said that it made her no longer want to wear a skirt or shorts again, adding: "I do not want this to happen to anybody else."

Mawson, who appeared in court via video link to prison, also went on to breach a sexual harm order and the sex offenders register. He did this by setting up three accounts on dating websites Hinge, Bumble and Tinder without informing police.

He also used an alias to set up a profile on a gaming website called Steam, in which users can communicate, without telling officers. He called himself 'Patrick Bateman' after the fictional character in horror film American Psycho.

Mawson, High Street, Willington, County Durham, pleaded guilty to sexual assault on a female, voyeurism, three counts of making indecent photographs of a child and possessing an extreme pornographic image. He also admitted breaching a sexual risk order and failing to comply with the sexual offender register.

Brian Mark, defending, told the court that Mawson, who has slight Asperger's Syndrome, admits responsibly for his actions and apologises to the victims. He said: "He acknowledges that he needs serious help.

"What he does need is not just to be sent to a prison, receive no help or proper courses and then be thrown out. That would not assist society, it would not assist the court.

"What he wants is to have treatment so when he comes out of prison he's not going to go back to prison."

His barrister told the court that he is now disgusted by the videos and the pictures. He added: "He doesn't want to do that again. He never wants to behave in that way again. He said it's disgusting behaviour, behaviour he doesn't want to repeat."

Judge Joanne Kidd told Mawson that the offences he committed represent a pattern of "disturbing sexualised behaviour".

In relation to the sexual assault, the judge said: "You were extremely sexually preoccupied. You targeted a lone woman standing on a bridge in the middle of the day." She told him he had no consideration of the risk, which was a extremely concerning feature.

Judge Kidd sentenced him to 25 months in prison. She told him that he will be subject to notification and a sexual harm prevention order for a period of 10 years.

https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/paedophile-secretly-filmed-women-public-28737673

Have a barrel - in fact you probably have time to purchase a vineyard, plant a crop of your own specifications, give time for the vines to mature and produce a heavy crop of grapes, harvest them, press them and allow appropriate fermentation, bottle and allow to mature.

You could then probably drink yourself into oblivion for a number of years before giving up hope that such evidence will be produced.

Yes - I was also impressed that on this occasion the BS was treated as what it was.

I mistrust the wording his barrister has used. He said he "has slight Aspergers Syndrome" when they would usually say "has a diagnosis of X" so I do wonder if this is another thing he has self identified as / self diagnosed / did not meet the full criteria for assesement or diagnosis. One can hardly blame me for wondering.

So lying about being Trans, and possibly lying about being ND.

As a woman with Autism, I'm even more fucked off that this pig and the fact he is enabled to do this.

Well done to the woman who saw him, alerted the police, kept watch on him and helped some other women from becoming his next victims. It takes a lot of courage to act in the moment like that.

I know when I was caught out by a pervert masturbating in a unisex changing room I was so shocked I just quickly left. I'd like to think that now I'm a bit older I would be more proactive, but fear really can make you freeze.

Their comprehension skills are working well actually, which is exactly why they have to employ their ‘desperately clutching at straws’ skills with the ‘but what about Dads’? They could have saved themselves a lot of keystrokes by just writing ‘I don’t understand safeguarding’.

heathspeedwell and yes, very much well done that woman! Especially in these mad times, when she could so easily have found herself on the wrong side of the law in her attempts to safeguard other women and girls. Well done to the police also, who treated the But I’m a Lady as the bullshit it is.

Well-spotted!

I suspect that you are right that this is probably a self-diagnosis.

Weasel words.

And the women in there knew that at the time how?

When he walked in?

“Sorry, this is the ladies.”
”I’m a woman.”

Now what?

Unless you’re suggesting women take “reasonable precautions” every time there’s someone who is male but may be a woman or may not be a woman in the loos (or changing rooms)? And what are “reasonable precautions”? Walk out?

What are these precautions that affirm and don’t offend transwomen but challenge men?

Maybe someone could make a sign.

The only “anti trans” poster is the one advocating for taking reasonable precautions around what could very well be a transwoman.

And bringing in dads is meaningless when in your world you never know if your dad’s your mum🤣

And I’d have respect for posters like maddy if at any point they said “actually, you know what, self ID/acceptance without exception/ people use spaces they’re most comfortable with DOES raise a few issues, maybe we need a rethink instead of the blah blah blah they come out with to avoid admitting this IS affecting women and girls negatively.

Janes post went down fast. What kind of thing was it?

From the Equality Act 2010
(1)A person has the protected characteristic of gender reassignment if the person is proposing to undergo, is undergoing or has undergone a process (or part of a process) for the purpose of reassigning the person's sex by changing physiological or other attributes of sex.

So, to be clear to those insisting that Mawson is not trans:
this person said that they identified as female,
they were using female facilities,
they tried to use a high pitched voice to speak (sounds very much like trying to change a physiological attribute of sex)

That's not 'trans' enough for you?

I wonder if Mawson had also told the police that their name was, say, 'Alice' rather than Kurtis would you so merrily be he/him-ing him here, Maddy and friends?

Honestly, whatever happened to Acceptance without Exception...

I placed Maddy's description of the offender as not being trans alongside Nicola Sturgeon's description of Isla Bryson as not being trans.

I wonder how long the offender has to maintain the claim that they are a woman for the crime to be recorded as being committed by a woman. Is it right up to conviction and sentence?

Wow.

How many times have we been told, "No man would pretend to be trans just to go in a toilet and assault women?"

I got the impression from the Scarlett Blake thread, that if they are charged as a "women" ie claim to be on arrest, then that sticks all the way through the process of trial and incarceration, even if they later say otherwise, or (rightly) are placed in the male estate.

However IANAL and may have misinterpreted it.

And this in a nutshell is an issue

In front of you are two people who are dressed as women. One is a trans woman with a pink lady brain, one is a sex offender wearing a skirt. How can we as women tell the difference?

This person has bought equipment to do this, had hundreds of images on his phone he had taken so likely had been doing this for some time before being caught. Had he been able to be challenged earlier then there would have been far less victims

So if this person was in the toilets next to you you would be OK with it? They said the magic words 'I identify as a woman' so they are trans.

If this is not a trans woman but a man using the trans card to access vulnerable women for sexual gratification (and based on the number of images he had taken this had been going on for some time) then please educate us on how we can tell them apart?

In front of you are two people who are dressed as women. One is a trans woman with a pink lady brain, one is a sex offender wearing a skirt. How can we as women tell the difference?

Exactly. And it makes no odds anyway. He said he identified as a woman. Instantly he has become as trans as anyone else.

What did people think 'self ID' actually meant? There is no gatekeeping. Nothing. It's just a man who says the words. Actually it's just a man who walks into a woman's space, because just the act of walking in declares a chosen identity.

If any man can enter women's spaces under the TQ+ access, then any man at all can, at any time, with any agenda. And until he actually does something to the point of being arrested - bear in mind the less than 1% of actual rape convictions - there is fuck all any woman can do but leave the space.

This is one of the reasons why women have a few whacking great issues with this agenda, which benefits males at the great expense of females, on an entirely binary sexed basis.

@Maddy70 Please can you explain how I can tell if someone is genuinely is trans? If we cannot accept what people say as true, and perverts are using this as a way of accessing women and girls what is the solution?

These are the trans activists' rules.

To those who think the man in the story was just trying it on and isn't trans, but that we are all anti trans transphobes:

Below is a photo of Alex Drummond who is busy "expanding the bandwidth of what it means to be a woman"

When confronted by someone dressed like this with a beard in the women's toilets are we allowed to say excuse me mate you're in the wrong loos or not?

How about on a day when they are wearing trousers or jeans like a lot of women do, maybe hadn't bothered with the makeup and the jewellery, as a lot of women don't. Can we tell him then he's in the wrong loos?

At what point is it being anti trans or transphobic to ask a very obvious bloke what the fuck he is doing in the ladies, and at what point is it OK to ask because that man is obviously trying it on and up to no good?

How the fuck are we supposed to know whether someone presenting like this is a man trying it on or a man with special internal feelings? Skirt or no skirt. Jewellery or no jewellery, long hair or short hair, make up or no make up? What is it that says this a man or this is a man who has special dispensation to enter women's spaces as he feels like he's a woman?

Annoying Mumsnet have chopped Alex's head off You'll have to click to see the beard

That’s a very unflattering picture of Alex,@Boiledbeetle

He used to make a very good looking bloke in guyliner. Mind that is probably a youngster’s look.