A BACUP man caught with nearly 2,000 indecent images of children has been convicted of inciting a young girl to engage in sexual activity when he visited a donkey enclosure.

As well as the indecent images, Gerrard Cadd, 55, was also initially charged with sexual offences involving three young girls.

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Cadd, of Pendle Close, Bacup, denied five offences at Burnley Crown Court, including indecent assault, assaulting a child under 13 and sexual activity with a child, and two charges of causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity.

Not guilty verdicts were ordered in relation to the offences concerning one of the girls, on the direction of trial judge Simon Newell. Cadd was also cleared of two further charges.

But he was found guilty of inciting a girl to engage in sexual activity during a trip to the donkey enclosure at Healey Dell nature reserve, near Whitworth.

David Traynor, prosecuting, said the girl, then 12, had been at Healey Dell when Cadd exposed himself and asked her to touch him.

Cadd accepted that he went behind a tree to urinate while at Healey Dell but he had never deliberately exposed himself.

Mr Traynor said Cadd was also involved in ‘sexualised behaviour’ with a third girl, involving touching her on the legs and chest, to which he was found not guilty.

Cadd, who admitted possessing indecent images before trial, was remanded on bail for pre-sentence report.