June 2016 Paedophile who preyed on teenage boys jailed A PAEDOPHILE who abused teenage boys at his home in the 1980s has been jailed for four years. The three boys, who were aged around 14 or 15, where invited to Derrick Molyneux’s Farnworth home, where they were given alcohol before spending the night. Brendan O’Leary, prosecuting, told how the teenagers got to know Molyneux through a friend who was related to the older man. “The defendant would invite these boys to his house and other areas as a group and normally, with the consumption of alcohol and while there, he would indecently assault them,” said Mr O’Leary. The court heard that the offences took place sometime between the start of 1987 and the end 1989. The boys spent time with the defendant at Farnworth Veterans Club, where he worked behind the bar and on one occasion he took them swimming at Farnworth baths. Each of the boys told police how, after drinking, they would spend the night at Molyneux’s home, but the man would climb into their beds and sexually assault them under their underwear or try to get them to touch his private parts. After the abuse the boys did not discuss it with anyone and it was not reported to police until they became adults. “They felt embarrassed and didn’t feel comfortable discussing it,” said Mr O’Leary. But he added that the boys did not forget the abuse, two of them suffered depression and media reports of high profile similar cases weighed heavily on them. Molyneux, aged 56, was arrested in September 2014 and denied committing the offences. But at Bolton Crown Court Molyneux, now of Glyn Y Marl Road, Llandudno Junction, Gwynedd, pleaded guilty to three counts of indecent assault. The court heard that he has a previous conviction for gross indecency with a child, for which he received 12 months probation in 1984. Simon Killeen, defending, said: “The reality is a background of a grooming type of behaviour.” But he added that Molyneux, who he described as a “rather lonely, sad figure” could recall little about events involving the boys and has been self-harming while in prison. Sentencing Molyneux to four years in jail, Judge Graeme Smith told him: “These offences were committed in the context of, effectively, grooming behaviour and, it seems, there may have been other victims as well.” He added: “You were, in effect, in a position of trust for them and they were particularly vulnerable for that reason.” In addition the the jail sentence, Molyneux was placed on the sex offenders’ register for an indefinite period and will be subject to a sexual harm prevention order.