October 2020 Convicted sex offender jailed after grooming 11-year-old boy A sex offender who lied about being cured of his sexual desires for small boys has been jailed after he groomed and 11-year-old boy. James Watson had been convicted a decade earlier for doing exactly the same thing while living in Essex, Exeter Crown Court was told. Watson completed a sex offenders’ treatment programme after that offence and later claimed to have a certificate from a counsellor which proved he was no longer a risk to children. He was put on the sex offenders register and made subject to a Sexual Offences Prevention Order which restricted his contact with children when he was first convicted in 2008. Both orders had expired by the time he met his second victim. He struck up a bond with a boy, whose mum knew nothing of his background and naively thought the relationship was ‘sweet and innocent’. In reality, Watson was abusing the boy on a regular basis. The truth only came out when social services realised that he was a convicted sex offender and alerted the mother. Tree surgeon Watson, aged 38, of Broadwoodkelly, near Okehampton, denied two counts of inciting a child to sexual activity but was found guilty by a jury at Exeter Crown Court in August. He was jailed for ten years with a six years extended licence after Judge Timothy Rose told him that he was a danger to the public. The judge said: ”This was not the first time you have behaved in this way. Your previous conviction shares features which are remarkably similar. “The boy was particularly vulnerable and you targeted him when he was only 11 or 12. You knew precisely what you were doing. You were inveigling your way into the trust of the family in order to create the opportunity to offend. “You knew you had a highly relevant previous conviction but had no intention whatsoever of sharing that with the family. “As part of your previous sentence you underwent intensive supervision which you later claimed had cured you. It did not, and the danger which you presented to children went on under the radar.” The judge imposed an indefinite Sexual Harm Prevention Order which forbids any contact with boys in the future. He put Watson on the sex offenders’ register for life. Mr Nigel Wraith, prosecuting, said Watson abused the boy until social services learned about it and alerted the mother in 2018. He told her he had been cured and showed her a certificate from a counsellor to prove it. His previous convictions were at Chelmsford Crown Court in 2008 for sexually assaulting a boy aged nine and taking indecent pictures of him. He carried on downloading more images of boys while awaiting trial. The mother of his latest victim made an impact statement saying the last two and a half years had been ‘pure hell’. Watson told the jury that he had no sexual interest in children and had no sexual contact with the boy.