James Cornell

A convicted sex offender from Colchester has been sentenced for breaching a court order by deleting his online message history, as reported by the Gazette on 30th October. James Cornell, aged 26, of Ashbury Drive, Marks Tey, admitted to eight counts of breaching a sexual harm prevention order at Ipswich Crown Court.

Cornell was first sentenced in 2018 as a teenager for luring two young girls into a wooded area to massage their feet, an offence that led to the imposition of a seven-year sexual harm prevention order. This order prohibited him from deleting any search or internet history on his electronic devices to allow monitoring by authorities. Despite complying with the order for six-and-a-half years, Cornell breached it in June 2024 by wiping sexual conversations he had conducted on WhatsApp with female escorts.

Prosecutor Olivia Rawlings told the court that during a scheduled meeting with an officer in June 2024, Cornell presented his phone, which had been cleared of the conversations. Upon inspection, it was revealed that he had engaged in sexual exchanges including messages, voice notes, photographs, and videos with the women. 'When his phone was reviewed by officers and the software was inspected, it became clear that he had been engaging in sexual conversations with female contacts on WhatsApp,' Rawlings stated.

Mitigating, Dan Santos-Costa argued that the material involved consenting adults and was not criminal, describing the deletion as stemming from embarrassment rather than an attempt to evade detection. 'The underlying material appeared to be between consenting adults. One may consider the topics to be irregular, but not criminal – there was some sexual proclivity that was being explored consensually,' Santos-Costa said. He noted Cornell's stable employment as a car salesman and supportive family.

Sentencing, Recorder Mrs Sally O’Neill KC expressed regret at the breach so late into the order. 'It’s a great shame you are here before the court, six-and-a-half years into a seven-year order with breaches which you admitted immediately. The content was not against the law, it was the deletion of them that has put you in breach,' she remarked. Cornell received a community order comprising 30 days of rehabilitation activity and 50 hours of unpaid work. He was also ordered to pay £150 in costs and a £114 victim surcharge, with his Samsung phone forfeited and destroyed.