Avoiding a prison sentence a man, Brian Edwards GALASHIELS Paedophile, captured in a police “sting” was sending sexual messages to what he believed to be a 12-year-old girl.
Selkirk Sheriff Court was informed that 68-year-old Brian Edwards requested the “youngster” to forward him “naughty pictures”.
He advised her, should someone enquire, to say she was his granddaughter after scheduling to meet the person he knew as “Olivia” at the Galashiels Transport Interchange in April last year.
Calling her a “naughty sweetheart,” Brian Edwards also enquired about sharing a bed and whether she would be wearing seductive lingerie. He said, “Age was only a number.”
But he had been corresponding with an undercover police agent who created a fictitious online persona drawing his interest.
More than a hundred obscene pictures of minors on a mobile phone were discovered when authorities searched his house.
Ed Hulme, a paedophile defence lawyer, claimed his client suffered an acquired brain impairment from past alcohol consumption.
Brian Edwards accepted possession of offensive photographs of children as well as counts of trying to meet someone he thought to be a child under the age of thirteen.
After weighing the terms of a psychiatric report, Sheriff Peter Paterson instituted an 18-month community payback order under supervision as a substitute for custody.
Between 7 pm and 7 am, he also put him on a six-month night-time curfew, ensuring he stayed in his house in Tulley Court.
Brian Edwards also had his name entered on the Sex Offenders Register for the following five years.
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