A SEX offender, who travelled from Norfolk to the North East thinking he was meeting a girl for sex, has been told a prison sentence is “inevitable”.
Michael Stacey, 47, from Great Yarmouth, thought he had been chatting to a 13-year-old online, but in reality, he fell for a decoy profile posted by an officer from the North East Regional Special Operations Unit (NERSOU), who informed Northumbria Police.
Officers were at the “meeting point” in Sunderland to arrest Stacey, who went on to admit arranging a child sex offence and engaging in sexual communication with a child.
He appeared for what was to have been the sentencing hearing at Newcastle Crown Court yesterday, but his counsel, Lee Fish, asked for an adjournment to allow for a psychiatric assessment on his client.
Mr Fish said: “He fully accepts a custodial sentence will follow, but this may help to assess the length of that sentence.”
Judge Christopher Prince agreed to adjourn the case to allow the assessment to be made, but said that whatever the outcome of that, a prison sentence was ,“inevitable”.
Stacey, who remains in custody in the meantime, will now be sentenced on January 31.
