June 2009
Mum slams child abuser’s prison sentence
A MOTHER has slammed the “disgraceful” prison sentence handed to a paedophile who tricked his way to earning her trust before abusing her young son.
Despite having served two separate jail terms for child sex offences and an “irresistible impulse to abuse children”, Mark Chapman (44) was locked up for just 30 months after a judge complained he was prevented by law from imprisoning him for any longer.
As the sentence was passed at Peterborough Crown Court, the mother of the 11-year-old city boy he abused by forcing him to watch pornography walked out of the public gallery in disgust.
Speaking to The Evening Telegraph outside the courtroom on Friday, she said: “It’s disgraceful. He should have got much longer but he’ll be out in not much more than a year.
“He deliberately deceived us so he could get into our lives and then the first chance he got, he abused my boy. This sentence is just not good enough.”
The court heard Chapman moved to the city from Newcastle-upon-Tyne after being sentenced to eight and a half years in prison for physically and sexually abusing a seven-year-old girl.
He was locked up for a second time in 2007 – this time for a year – after police found a collection of indecent images of children on his mobile phone and computer at his home in Peterborough
Despite being banned from communicating with children, he tried to cover up his shameful past by changing his name to Mark Mancer. Then, after meeting the boy’s parents last summer, he befriended them to such an extent that he was treated “like an uncle” to their children.
On the day heavy snowfall caused chaos in Peterborough on February 5 this year, Chapman seized an opportunity when he was asked to collect the 11-year-old from school.
Prosecutors said he took the youngster to his flat where he sat him on his lap and showed him pornographic movies on his computer while rubbing the boy’s leg.
Chapman, of Copsewood in Werrington, Peterborough, pleaded guilty to a charge of causing a child to watch a sexual act and to a further charge of breaching a sexual offences prevention order.
Judge Patrick Moloney QC described Chapman as a paedophile who posed a continuing danger to young children. He said: “I’m very concerned that this man has an irresistible impulse to abuse children.”
But the judge added that because of the relatively minor nature of Chapman’s offence, he was powerless to impose on him an indeterminate prison sentence for public protection, which would have meant he could only be released once he was no longer considered dangerous.
“I wish I had the power because, if I did, I would use it,” he said.
Because Chapman has already served 83 days in custody on remand, the 30-month sentence means he is likely to be freed in June 2010.
