Former Leeds teacher and sex offender jailed

A retired school teacher from Leeds, who broke the terms of a sexual harm prevention order by giving a boy a lift in his sports car, has been jailed.
19th February 2013. David Hope leaves Leeds Crown Court.19th February 2013. David Hope leaves Leeds Crown Court.
19th February 2013. David Hope leaves Leeds Crown Court.

David Hope also breached the sex offender register rules by being in contact with another schoolboy.

The incidents happened when he was staying at a Shropshire guest house, where the two boys were also staying, in August last year.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The 69-year-old former music teacher was given a four-month sentence when he appeared at Shrewsbury Crown Court last week.

Hope, of Granby Close, Headingley, was also made subject a fresh sexual harm prevention order which will run for an indefinite period.

The court heard that in 2013 at Leeds Crown Court the defendant had admitted offences relating to the possession of indecent images of children.

He had more than 2,000 images of boys, many wearing just swimming trunks or their underwear, which were either photographs or material downloaded on the internet.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

His sentence included a sexual harm prevention order for five years which prohibited him from having unsupervised contact with children under the age of 16 and that he was on the sex offenders’ register for a similar period.

In January this year Hope, admitted failing to comply with the requirements of the sex offenders register and breaching his sexual harm prevention order between August 5 and 13 last year.

The court heard yesterday that Hope had stayed at a guest house in Ludlow where there were children under 16 and he had sat in an outside courtyard each morning where a boy had been present.

Mr Kevin Jones, prosecuting, said the boy’s mother had been unaware of Hope’s conviction and he had failed to tell police he was staying somewhere where children were also staying.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

He said that on another occasion Hope had given a lift to another boy in his two-seater sports car and was alone with the boy for approximately 15 minutes.

Mr Andrew Holland, for Hope, said his client had followed the requirements of the court orders for four years.

When Hope arrived in Ludlow and realised a child would be staying at the same place he had tried to call his public protection officer in Leeds, but had no phone signal.

He said that Hope accepted the incident with the second boy when he gave him a ride in his car should not have happened.

Related topics: