A child pornography “addict” who was unmasked as a sexual predator when one of his victims saw his court appearance online avoided a jail sentence yesterday.
One of Liam Mackay’s victims was shown a Facebook post about the 28-year-old being sentenced for possessing and downloading thousands of indecent images of children.
The girl, now a young woman, ran out of the room in tears and was sick before confessing to her aunt that Mackay had sex with her when she was 14.
Her confession was later told to police and it led to the discovery of another girl Mackay had sexual activity with in 2012.
Yesterday at Inverness Sheriff Court, 29-year-old Mackay of Deas Avenue, Dingwall, was sentenced to 260 hours of unpaid community work, placed under supervision for three years and put on the sex offenders register for the same period.
Last month, Mackay admitted having under age sex and engaging in sex activity with under age girls between December, 2010 and December, 2012.
Sentence was deferred for a background report by Sheriff Gordon Fleetwood, who had previously sentenced Mackay in 2016.
He told Mackay then he was considering a jail sentence for his “deviant sexual practices.”
In the more recent case, the Sheriff heard that Mackay had become “addicted” to child porn after accidentally accessing it.
Defence solicitor advocate Mike Chapman said: “It is clear from the report he is working well on the earlier community payback order and he is keen to make changes.
“There has been no further offending and he is a different man compared to when he committed these offences in his early 20s.”
Fiscal depute Roderick Urquhart had told the court that Mackay worked at a supermarket and befriended girls outside the store.
