Judge orders no retrial for convicted paedophile

But the charges will go on Keith Slingsby Burton's criminal record with a note that they have not been proved in court.

He already has 17 internet child porn convictions for which he served an eight-month prison sentence last winter.

In addition, he is part way through two years of supervision by the probation service, banned from working with children for the rest of his life and on the sex offenders' register for ten years.

Earlier this month, a jury who were unaware of the child porn convictions could not decide whether Burton, 60, of Old Trough Way, Harrogate, indecently abused an ex-choirboy whom he had met previously through their common interest in music.

They heard from both the boy, now a teenager, and Burton about two alleged incidents in 2003.

Burton claimed the sexual abuse had never happened, the boy alleged that it had.

After a day of deliberations the jury was discharged and the prosecution asked for a week to decide whether to retry Burton.

When the case returned to court, at the prosecution's request, the Honorary Recorder of York, Judge Paul Hoffman, let the charges lie on file, which means they will be on Burton's record, but not as a conviction, and he will not face a retrial.

Last November, York Crown Court heard that police found nearly three pornographic video clips of children and 2,500 pictures of children being abused or in sexual or erotic poses on the former physics lecturer's home computer on June 21, 2004.

Detectives had found his credit card details on a pornographic website.

Twenty-one of the pictures were at level four of the five-point Copine Scale, which means they were hard core porn.

Burton's barrister Chris Smith said that since his arrest, he had resigned all his positions, including his job at the university, a school governorship and being the treasurer of a local theatre group.

The university confirmed he no longer worked there.

Updated: 10:05 Monday, August 01, 2005