A FORMER McDonald’s worker breached his sexual harm prevention order by lying to the police about having a mobile phone just one month after it was issued.

Burnley Crown Court heard how Samuel Peter Lenton Williams was given the order on June 13 after pleading guilty to three counts of making indecent images of children and one of distributing an indecent image of a child.

Williams, 23, was given a five-year sexual harm prevention order which required him to produce any devices capable of accessing the internet when asked by the police and to not delete his internet history.

But when officers went to his home in Bury Road, Haslingden, after Williams had made complaints about threats from neighbours, he lied about having a mobile phone.

Prosecuting, Peter Barr said: “When the officers arrived the defendant took some time to open the door.

"He seemed initially reluctant to let them into the house to speak to him. Eventually he did let them in.

“The officer asked Mr Williams if he had any internet enabled devices, Mr Williams said no. He asked him if he had a mobile phone and Mr Williams said no.”

Williams then told police he was ‘staying away from the internet because he didn’t want to get into more trouble’.

However officers noticed there was an internet hub in his living room.

Mr Barr said officers went upstairs and found an iPhone phone charger plugged into a socket in the defendant’s bedroom. Officers found a phone tucked in between his bed and mattress.

Mr Barr said: “Williams conceded the phone was his and he had had it for two weeks. He was taken to the police station.

"When he was interviewed he accepted all the charges that had been read out to him.”

Williams pleaded guilty to three counts of breaching a sexual harm prevention order in that he failed to inform police that he had bought an internet enabled smartphone, failed to make an internet enabled smart phone available for inspection, and had deleted the internet history.

Defending, Neil Howard said that his client had worked at McDonald’s for five years but lost that job as a result of his child pornography convictions. He said that Williams had been engaging well with the probation service before and after the breach.

Judge Jonathan Gibson sentenced Williams to four weeks' imprisonment suspended for 18 months and pay £100 prosecution costs, which will be deducted from his benefits.