Glyn Charles Stokes, 39, of Slacks Creek sentenced for breaches of child sex offender reporting duties
A “quite hopeless” child sex offender who opened a new Instagram account, failed to report to police and contacted a child has been granted parole release, despite breaching existing parole.
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A convicted child sex offender who failed five times to honour his “very important” reporting duties, while on parole and a suspended jail sentence, has walked free from court.
Appearing at Beenleigh Magistrates Court on Monday, Glyn Charles Stokes, 39, was supported by multiple family members.
The Slacks Creek man pleaded guilty to five counts of failing to comply with reporting.
The court heard Stokes failed to inform police immediately when he changed his contact details, opened an Instagram account without informing police and contacted a child victim.
The offending was aggravated for occurring after Stokes had been previously sentenced in district court for two incidents of indecently touching a child.
He had spent 190 days in pre-sentence custody for those offences.
Defence solicitor Samit Seth said his client was “quite hopeless” at managing his own affairs and had not actually approached the victim.
The court heard Stokes had eventually fulfilled his quarterly reporting duties, but not in a timely manner.
Mr Seth said the defendant now understood the gravity of his reporting duties and would be supported in addressing them by family members.
A submission by the defence that Stokes’ offending amounted to mere “technical breaches” was rejected by magistrate Claire Kelly.
Ms Kelly said given his past offending against a child, his reporting duties were “very important”.
Stokes was sentenced to six months’ jail and granted immediate parole release.
A previous suspended jail sentence of six months was further activated, to operate over 12 months.
The court heard should the defendant commit any offence punishable by prison sentence within the next six months, he would likely be imprisoned.
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