A sex offender just out of prison who tried to hire a prostitute while he was staying in a hostel in Cornwall claimed her text was from his dad. Christopher Wheeler had only been free for four days and was under strict licence conditions when police examined a phone he had just bought.
They found he had changed its settings to delete its internet history, which he was banned from doing by a Sexual Harm Prevention Order (SHPO) that had been imposed when he was sent to jail the previous year. Police suspected he had already started using his new phone to search for child abuse images because a download of his last device had unearthed 524 photos or videos and he has previous convictions for accessing such material.
The two police officers and the manager of the hostelwhere he was staying were in the middle of examining his new phone when a text appeared from a prostitute asking why Wheeler had failed to make a rendez-vous in Camborne an hour earlier. He was arrested, not for trying to arrange sex with the woman, but for breaking the SHPO by deleting the phone’s internet history, which was forbidden explicitly by the order.
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It is the second time Wheeler has been jailed for breaking the order, having been sentenced to 20 months last August for trying to destroy evidence of him contacting children in chat rooms. Wheeler, aged 31, of East Hill, Tuckingmill, Camborne, admitted two breaches of the SHPO and three counts of making, by downloading, indecent images or movies of children.
He was jailed for a year and four months by Judge David Evans at Exeter Crown Court. He told him: “The police found the internet search history function turned off, disabling the retention of your online activity.
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“You clearly had been engaging in activity online in the days since obtaining the phone but the full extent of that cannot be ascertained. That is why the order is there. I see from the pre-sentence report that you continue to deny a sexual interest in children.”
Ed Bailey, prosecuting, said Wheeler was released from his previous sentence on May 10 this year and visited by his police offender manager at the Meneghy House hostel on May 14 after he told him he had bought a new phone.
A text message arrived before Wheeler handed over the phone and he managed to delete it before the officers could see it, falsely claiming it was from his father. A second text arrived as police were examining the phone which was from a prostitute and asking what was going on.
He had also used the phone to set up a new Gmail account without telling the police, something else which was banned by the SHPO. The images offences arose from a full download of the Samsung phone seized from Wheeler when he was arrested in July 2023 for the SHPO breach which led to him being jailed the next month.
There were a total of 524 items of which 141 stills and 101 movies were in the most serious category, effectively showing children as young as two being raped.
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Nick Lewin, defending, said Wheeler is not tech savvy and does not know how the internet memory function was turned off. He said he should have been dealt with for the images offences when he was sentenced last year.
