David was referred by Airdrie PF charged with an adult sexual offence against a female over 16 years of age.
David is a nineteen-year-old male who has no prior history of offending, he left school at seventeen with four National 4 qualifications, and was attending College studying Carpentry and Joinery. He has no addiction issues, reporting moderate drinking at weekends and has never tried any illegal substance.
He has a strong work ethic, spending his time during the week attending college and working in fast food outlets I the evenings. At the weekends, he works for Rock Steady Security as a steward at football games or big events then in the food outlets in the evening.
At the time of the alleged offence, a female who he roughly knew through other friends had added him to Snapchat; they struck up a friendship and conversed regularly about ‘day to day events’.
This person then messaged him ‘her’ phone number telling him to save it as her mobile number, she then sent him the sexually explicit message that he was subsequently charged with on Snapchat, telling him to then text it to ‘her’ mobile number that ‘she’ had provided, he thought that this was ‘strange’ however did it anyway.
He stated that he got no sexual pleasure from this and that he wasn’t looking to enter into a sexual relationship with the female that he thought he was texting and conversing with.
The actual female that had received the text message contacted the Police who quickly traced David’s phone number. When the Police arrived and spoke to him in regards to the text message he was shocked and felt stupid, as he didn’t know the recipient of the message he had been duped into sending.
David regrets the full incident; he feels that he has let his family down and shamed them as well as being in fear for himself in how this might affect his future.
David was assessed as suitable and placed on Diversion from Prosecution during which he engaged well and made himself available. He was allocated to the Justice Social Work Assistant who made referrals to partner agencies and supported him to work on:
- Consequential Thinking
- Assertiveness
- Emotion Management
- Healthy Sexual Functioning
David completed exercises where he reflected on the offence and the positives and negatives of changing his problematic behaviours for himself and others. He unpicked how he had reacted in an inappropriate manner after being talked in to sending a text message by another person and the best way to manage his emotions in a more constructive manner and not to be talked into doing things for others that he knows he should not do. He explored what is acceptable/unacceptable when attempting to develop relationships with others.
David was referred to the ‘Make it Work’ Justice employability project delivered by the Lennox Partnership regarding College Courses and preparation work for potential employment opportunities and engaged well with them, he gained a placement on a pre-apprenticeship College based course on joinery.
David did not re-offend during his Diversion from Prosecution Order, he engaged making use of reflective learning materials/exercises concerning his treatment needs and the potential consequences that may occur if he continued in his previous behaviour.
He successfully completed his Diversion in 3 months and has his life back on track following the offence, continuing with the pre-apprenticeship.