October 2013 Wibsey sexual predator is jailed for assault A convicted rapist and paedophile who lured a young woman to his flat after buying her sexy underwear has been branded a “sexual predator” and jailed for three years. Andrew Sharman paid his vulnerable victim to send him explicit texts about her sex life and kept a diary about his attraction to her, Bradford Crown Court heard yesterday. The 54-year-old tried to blackmail her with the contents of the diary to stop her going to the police. Sharman has previous convictions for sexual offences that include indecent assault on a 12 year old girl, two counts of rape and four counts of indecent assault Sharman, of Carr Bottom Fold, Wibsey, Bradford, pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting the woman, in her 20s, on July 14, 2011. He had previous convictions for rape and indecent assault, dating back 35 years, prosecutor Nick Askins said. Sharman complimented the woman on her looks and told her he wanted to watch her having sex. He bought her six pairs of knickers and a bra and invited her round to his flat. When she turned up with her boyfriend, Sharman asked her into his bedroom and turned up the music in the living room. Sharman groped the girl, told her to take off her clothing and pushed her on to his bed. When she resisted, he said: “I’m just feeling. There’s now’t wrong.” He stood in the doorway but she managed to shove her way past him. Sharman texted her soon afterwards offering to take painkillers. He said if she went to the police she should bear in mind what he had written about her in his diary. He told the police he tickled the girl in his bedroom to cheer her up. In 1976, Sharman was convicted at Bradford Youth Court of indecently assaulting a young man and woman after chasing them across a field. He threatened to kill them, removed their underwear and sexually abused them. In 1981, he was jailed for 18 months for two offences of rape and two of indecent assault. Sharman went on to indecently assault a 12-year-old girl and was jailed for ten months in 1994. His solicitor, Anne-Marie Hutton, said he was in poor health after an industrial accident. Judge John Potter told Sharman he saw his victim as “a sex object”. He labelled him a sexual predator and made a Sexual Offences Prevention Order to safeguard his victim in the future. Sharman must sign on the sex offenders’ register for life.