Paedophile freed by Leeds judge and told: 'You have done your best to go to prison'
A paedophile who was caught chatting up an account he believed was a 12-year-old girl - just months after being caught downloading abuse images - has been spared immediate custody.
Regan Lord was on a suspended sentence when he resumed his sick interests online, only to be reeled in by an undercover police officer posing as a youngster.
The 29-year-old was told by Judge Robin Mairs at Leeds Crown Court this week: “You have done your very best to try and send yourself to prison after receiving a suspended sentence.”
Instead, he gave him a new 24-month sentence, suspended for 24 months, with 100 hours of unpaid work to complete and 14 rehabilitation days with probation.
He was put on the sex offender register for 10 years and given a 10-year sexual harm prevention order (SHPO) designed to curb his internet use.
The court previously heard that Lord was convicted of possessing indecent images of children and handed a nine-month sentence, suspended for two years, in early 2025.
But within months, the predatory pervert latched onto the supposed 12-year-old girl on the chatroom platform, Chatib.
She told him she was 12, but it failed to deter him, prosecutor Jennifer Gatland told the court.
They moved the conversation to Snapchat and asked her is she was “horny too”.
He sent the account a picture of himself in his boxer shorts, and told her he was in bed waiting for her.
He asked her for an explicit photo, claiming he wanted to know if she was real or fake, or even a police officer.
He was arrested from his home on Lee Moor Road in Stanley, Wakefield, on July 30. They found the boxer shorts he had posed in for the photograph.
They also found several devices he had not declared to his offender manager, putting him in breach of his SHPO.
During his police interview, he denied speaking to the supposed girl. He later admitted three counts of breach of his SHPO, and attempted sexual communications with a child.
Mitigating, Eleanor Durdy previously said that despite his offending he had engaged well and made progress since his arrest.
She said he accepted responsibility and “expressed disappointment in himself”. She said he struggled with his mental health and “knows his behaviour is inexcusable”.
Judge Robin Mairs told Lord during his last appearance: “These offences do not occur because of anxiety or depression, they occur because you have a sexual interest in children, pre-pubescent girls.
“It drove you to breach the SHPO deliberately, to seek out contact with what you believed was a 12-year-old girl.”