Upon his release from jail, a convicted sex offender, Mark Innes Cove Bay Paedophile, from Aberdeen violated the law once more by creating a TikTok account.
Mark Innes, aged 31, received a sentence for four charges in the city’s sheriff court in July 2020. Two cases involved engaging in sexual communication with a kid, while the other two cases involved the dissemination of revenge porn.
Mark Innes, who had no prior criminal record, received a nine-month prison sentence. Additionally, he was indefinitely mandated to adhere to the sex offender register rules, which prohibited him from creating social media profiles.
Prosecutor Steven Ball told Carlisle Crown Court that on July 1, 2023, Police Scotland notified the local police that the accused individual was residing with his girlfriend in the Carlisle region.
According to Mr. Ball, Innes typically resided in Aberdeen and was supervised by offender managers. Upon a visit from local officials in Cumbria to verify compliance, he willingly relinquished a Samsung mobile phone.
According to Mr Ball, the officers were worried when they discovered that he had visited a website suspected to be related to child sexual abuse, using Google on five separate occasions on June 12th. Furthermore, he had logged into the Telegram website on that particular day.
Upon further scrutiny of his phone, it was discovered that Mark Innes had created other social media profiles. TikTok, the initial one, was developed on the day he was released from detention on May 9.
Instagram was established on May 31st, followed by the creation of another messaging app a few weeks later. In March 2022, Innes was sent to prison on parole before being freed on May 9 of the current year.
During the interview, Mark Innes acknowledged his use of Telegram and participation in a chat group where explicit adult content was being discussed. He mentioned that he clicked on a link he received, which resulted in the appearance of four inappropriate photographs of children.
“Mr Ball stated that he was repulsed by what he had witnessed and returned to the location to discover a means of reporting it anonymously,” explained Mr Ball. Of the five instances he accessed the account, the final two were to delete it.
“He was unable to justify why he believed he would be able to access explicit adult content considering the name of the website.” He informed the police that he had inadvertently bypassed some of the photographs, but they autonomously downloaded. He asserted that this must have been unintentional.
He confessed to creating the social media accounts and failing to notify the police within three days of their creation. He believed that he had provided the police with his email account information, which he used to create the accounts, even though his username was unrelated to his name.
Mark Innes pleaded guilty to four charges of violating notice requirements and three charges of producing obscene photographs of children, including 22 images classified as category A, which is the most severe category.
Recorder Kate Bex KC sentenced the individual to 16 months in jail without delay after considering potential mitigating factors.
Mark Innes, who previously resided in Crawton Ness, Cove Bay, Aberdeen, is still obligated to comply with the notice requirements. Additionally, he is required to adhere to 19 supplementary restrictions as part of a distinct sexual harm prevention order that will be in effect for the next decade.
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