Man Jailed After Claiming to Hunt Paedophiles Online

A 39-year-old man has been sentenced to prison after engaging in sexual communication with what he believed were two 12-year-old girls and possessing indecent images of children. 📱⚖️

Stuart Goode, of no fixed abode, appeared before Mold Crown Court on Thursday, April 17, where he was jailed for 30 months after previously pleading guilty to arranging the commission of a child sex offence, two counts of attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child, and three counts of making indecent photographs of a child.

The court heard that North Wales Police were alerted to Goode’s activities in February last year by a regional covert unit from another force who had been communicating with him on the KIK messaging app while posing as two 12-year-old girls.

Prosecutor Elen Owen told the court that Goode engaged in sexual chat with one of the decoys, requested indecent images, and “entered into a relationship” with her over nine days. He also communicated with the second decoy for three days.

When police arrested Goode and seized his phone on February 27, he claimed he had been “looking for fake accounts to root out and catch paedophiles” – an excuse Judge Rhys Rowlands described as “utter nonsense” that the court is “seeing time and time again.”

Forensic examination of Goode’s device revealed nine category A images (the most serious), four category B images, and 19 category C images, along with 878 additional files that were “indicative of a sexual interest in children.”

In November, Goode told police that at the time of the offending, he had “been made redundant” and was “not in a good frame of mind.”

Defence solicitor Simon Mintz said that Goode had “lost everything” including his home, business and relationships, and accepted that a custodial sentence was “inevitable.”

Judge Rowlands described the offending as “very serious and disturbing” before sentencing Goode to 30 months imprisonment for arranging the commission of a child sex offence, with concurrent eight-month sentences for the sexual communication and indecent images charges.

Goode will be placed on the Sex Offenders Register indefinitely and will also be subject to a Sexual Harm Prevention Order indefinitely.