A sex offender branded a danger to all women is back on the streets, despite being jailed for 13 months for his latest crime on Tuesday.
Robert Basterfield was sentenced at Perth Sheriff Court after he admitted sending hand-drawn images of male genitals to two women from his prison cell.
He was immediately freed because the sentence was backdated to June 19 last year and he had been held on remand for the equivalent of an 18-month sentence.
Sent drawings to women
Basterfield, 49, from Perth, admitted breaking the terms of a Sexual Offences Prevention Order by sending the drawings to the women.
The court was told the strict ten-year order was imposed in conjunction with a previous jail term on April 10, 2019 but Basterfield breached it less than a fortnight later.
The order, banning him from having indecent communication with any woman, was breached on April 23, 2019 and again on April 20, 2020 when he sent the drawings to a banker and a housing officer.
Basterfield was previously jailed for 54 weeks for an identical offence in 2019, when he sketched his genitals and showed the image to two women.
He had previously shown intimate photographs to shop workers but resorted to drawing them by hand because he had no camera inside Perth Prison.
The crude sketches were shown to two female prison staff who were left “distressed” because of Basterfield’s background as a stalker and sex pest.
‘Adolescent art work’
Sheriff William Wood said: “It is clear you are a repeat sex offender. That gives context to any action you take.
“You made two drawings.
“One was of a sexual act, with the name of a female prison officer next to it.
“It must have been alarming for the prison officer.
“The greatest concern may not have been what happened in the prison, but what may happen upon your release.
“The court has to dissuade you from behaving like this in future.”
Solicitor Linda Clark, defending, said: “This is perhaps not the most serious offence he has appeared in relation to.
“I don’t think any of the art work is any more than you may see on an adolescent male’s jotter.”
Repeated sex offences
Basterfield, from Perth, had previously been convicted for showing photographs of his genitals to staff at a Boots store as he tried to buy Viagra.
In 2019, Basterfield became the first person in the UK to be made the subject of a SOPO twice and he was also banned from “sexting“.
Sheriff Lindsay Foulis jailed Basterfield and told him the best way to protect women from his deviant behaviour was to put him under a second SOPO.
The order will last for a decade and includes the groundbreaking sexting condition to limit “risque” phone chats unless a female specifically requests it.
In 2007, Basterfield became the first person in Scotland to be made the subject of a SOPO and was banned from being alone with any woman.
He had previously been prosecuted twice for stalking women in Perthshire and was jailed in 2006, which led to the police seeking the first SOPO against him.
