A CONVICTED sex offender who changed where he lived while on family business was caught out by police monitoring.

Francis Chown moved his address temporarily from Stockton to Romney in Kent to help sort out his dead father’s affairs.

While the 52-year-old was down south, he became friendly with a couple who had two girls and a boy all aged under 15.

Because of a conviction last May, he was banned from having contact with children without supervision or their parents knowing about it.

When police contacted the family, they discovered that Chown had not told them he was a convicted sex offender.

He had been given a six-month suspended prison sentence and a Sexual Offences Prevention Order for possessing indecent images of children.

Prosecutor David Crook told Teesside Crown Court that there was no allegation of sexual offences involving the children in Kent.

But he added: “The orders are monitored very strictly by the public protection unit and he was regularly asked questions about whether he was having contact with children."

Chown, of Hartington Road, pleaded guilty to breaching the SOPO and the suspended prison sentence.

Judge Peter Bowers said: "I am satisfied that these offences were committed in pretty unusual circumstances when you were clearing out your father’s house and you had contact with a family of two girls.”

Chown was given a six-month jail sentence, suspended for 18 months, with supervision.