Homeless Wakefield bus pervert locked up again tells judge: 'I wouldn't survive a shop doorway'
A homeless pervert banned from public transport has been jailed yet again, telling a judge: “I wouldn’t survive a shop doorway.”
Neil Poundford was handed a new two-month sentence for breaching a ban on him using public transport, having been convicted of groping females on buses in 2017.
The 65-year-old openly admits he purposely breaches the order by getting on a bus so he can be locked up because he has nowhere else to go.
Following the release from his last sentence handed down in November last year, he told Leeds Crown Court that nobody could help him find accomodation.
Representing himself in court, and appearing via video link from HMP Hull where he was being held on remand, he said: “The last three times I ‘ve been released I have been down to the council and they have had nothing for me.
“It was either a shop doorway or a park bench. I’m almost 66-years-old, I won’t survive a night in a shop doorway. I would take anywhere, but there’s not been a single offer.”
He said he did not want to go back to prison, but feels he has little choice. He said there had been no repeat of his sexual offending and simply sits on his own on the bus “staring out of the window”. He has breached the order 23 times since 2017.
The court was told he boarded a bus again earlier this month, and when nobody recognised him, he told a police officer and showed him his ticket to be arrested. He has been held on remand since February 3.
Poundford said he is waiting for his pension, which he will begin to receive from his 66th birthday next month, so he can afford to live and hopefully find rented accommodation.
Having been handed two months’ jail by Judge Christopher Batty, Poundford told him: “It’s a very fair judgement.”
Poundford was first convicted in August 2017 after he touched a 17-year-old’s face and arm on a bus between Wakefield and Dewsbury, then preyed on a 13-year-old girl at a bus stop in Horbury two months later, touching her face and knee.
He was jailed for 16 months and given the sexual harm prevention order (SHPO) - which bans him from being on public transport along. It will expire on August 2027.