November 2016 Pervert jailed for abusing boy A “dirty old man” with over one hundred previous convictions has been jailed for abusing a boy he wanted to be his “sexual plaything.” Carl Hoban, 65, bought the 15-year-old boy women’s underwear when on a trip to Ireland and deceived the youth’s mother into thinking he was offering him work, York Crown Court heard. As well as sexually assaulting him in his Pickering home, he also booked rooms at the Grand Hotel in Scarborough so he could abuse him there. “You were no more and no less than a dirty old man,” the Honorary Recorder of York, Judge Paul Batty QC said to Hoban as he jailed him for four years and put him on the sex offenders’ register for life. “You evidently wanted this boy for your sexual plaything. You even had the brass neck to attend the school play where he was performing. “I have no doubt that the sexual activity that occurred between you (and the boy) was extensive.” He also made him subject to a sexual harm prevention order, again for life, banning him from contacting the victim, or having any contact with any boy aged under 16. Hoban, of Mill House, Potter Hill, Pickering, was convicted by a jury of three counts of sexual activity with a child and three counts of grooming the child by booking hotel rooms. He had denied the charges. The judge accepted Hoban had not used threats towards the boy, who he said had “not been unwilling” to take part in the sexual activity. For Hoban, Kirstie Watson said he wanted to apologise to the boy and to the mother and was “very very sorry” for what he had done. The judge pointed out the best way to show his remorse would have been to plead guilty.