A Dundee pensioner has been jailed and placed on the sex offenders register for life for sexually abusing a child for more than six years.
Charles Clark, 81, was found guilty last month at the High Court in Glasgow of sexually abusing the child, who cannot be named for legal reasons.
Clark, who formerly ran a shoe repair shop in the Hilltown, appeared at the High Court for sentencing after being convicted of four charges, including using lewd, indecent and libidinous practices and behaviour towards the child.
He was also found guilty of making the child watch pornographic videos.
And the pensioner was found guilty of two further charges of possessing indecent images of children.
A further charge of having raped the child was previously withdrawn by the Crown.
Sentencing Clark to three years in prison, Lord Ericht told him that his crimes — which happened in Dundee and Angus in the mid-1990s and early-2000s — had taken a heavy toll on his victim.
Lorraine Glancy, who defended Clark, told the High Court that he accepted a custodial sentence was inevitable.
The lawyer said the convictions had brought Clark “disgrace”.
She added that on his release from prison, he was likely to leave the Dundee area and never return, as he was a familiar face in the city and would be a “well-known sex offender” in the community.
The pensioner had been a popular figure in the Coldside area while working in the Hilltown.
Clark had owned and run McLeod’s Shoe Repair shop in Strathmartine Road until last year, when he retired after 49 years.
https://www.eveningtelegraph.co.uk/fp/retired-dundee-shoe-shop-repair-owner-81-sexually-abused-child-deserves-die-jail/
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