A PAEDOPHILE is free to return to his new home in York after he broke the rules designed to protect children from him.

Karl William Martin Fox, 38, served six years in prison after he abused a boy in the 1990s and on his release was subject to a sex offenders’ order limiting what he could do.

York Crown Court heard how he came to York to get away from Scarborough and had got a home and work.

But in May last year, he showed a police officer charged with keeping an eye on him pornographic pictures featuring adults on his phone that he was not allowed to have under the order. There were a further two photos so extreme they were illegal for anyone to possess.

It was the fourth time he had breached the order, having previously talked to a child, tickled another child and made sexual requests.

Recorder Guy Kearl QC said that as the latest breach did not involve children he could spare Fox a return to prison.

“You do appear to be making significant progress,” he told Fox. “One part of this court’s job is to reward progress and punish misdemeanours.”

He gave Fox a community order with two years’ supervision and relaxed the sex offenders’ order so Fox could have adult pornography.

Fox, of Burtonstone Lane, Clifton, pleaded guilty to breaching the order and two charges of possessing extreme pornography.

His barrister, Laura Addy, said: “This is a man who since being released from custody has made very strong efforts to control, manage and prevent offences of which this order was focused, ie offences against children.”

One of the coping mechanisms he had developed, as instructed in sex offender rehabilitation courses, was viewing adult pornography, and that is why he had the photographs.

He had not committed any “significant”crimes other than breaching the order since the 1990s and he had told the police about his latest offence when the police had been unaware of it.