Children's entertainer convicted of sex offences against schoolboys spared jail

A children's holiday camp entertainer who committed a string of internet sex offences against four schoolboys has been spared jail.

Jason Gaunt deliberately took jobs at two resorts so he could groom "impressionable" youngsters for his own sexual gratification.

He then encouraged the boys - one of whom was just 11 years old at the time - to obtain webcams so he could perform sex acts in front of them.

The 22-year-old, of Walsall, West Midlands, who admitted a total of 19 charges - showed no emotion as he was handed a three-year community order at Guildford Crown Court today.

Judge Peter Moss said sentencing guidelines meant he was unable to impose a harsher prison term.

"These offences, make no mistake, are incredibly serious," he said.

"You deliberately undertook employment as a children's entertainer in a camp or holiday area and there you befriended families and their children and then engaged in a webcam link with them in order to perform acts of mutual masturbation via webcam."

This, he said, amounted to a "very serious breach of trust".

A pre-sentencing report revealed that Gaunt, who has an IQ of 130, just a point away from what is described as "very superior" intelligence, was a "manipulative" character who posed a "significant risk of serious harm".

Hitting out at legal guidelines which prevented him from jailing the defendant for "public protection", the judge said: "It is with considerable reluctance that I find myself in a position where I would normally impose a custodial sentence."

The maximum jail term he could have handed down would have been one of only two years, he said.
Gaunt has already served 121 days in custody and any prison sentence imposed would have been reduced because of his guilty pleas which were taken into consideration.

"I am effectively, by statute, by Parliament, deprived from passing a sentence that I know many outside this court would say you richly deserve," the judge told him.

At an earlier hearing, the court heard Gaunt met his first victim, an 11-year-old boy, while working at Kessingland Park Resort in Lowestoft, Suffolk, in March 2007. He struck up a rapport with the youngster and this continued until November 2008.

Though there was no evidence an offence was committed while he was with the child, he later encouraged the boy to find a webcam so he could watch him masturbate.

But the youngster's mother became suspicious and contacted police.

Gaunt was snared after officers posing as the boy set up an email account which led to his arrest in February last year.

An investigation on two of his laptops revealed crimes involving another two boys, the oldest of whom was 14 at the time.

It was not until Gaunt, a prison officer's son, of Leander Close, Walsall, West Midlands, appeared in court and details of his behaviour were made public that the parents of the fourth child came forward.