Sex pest with history of groping women spared jail

Iqbal Hussain had several previous convictions for similar offences when he sexually assaulted his latest victim in Spon Lane, Smethwick on April 3, Wolverhampton Crown Court heard.

Mr Mohammad Hafeez, prosecuting, said: “She realised someone was behind her when he suddenly reached forward and touched her intimately. She pushed him away and he apologised.”

The woman then saw him go into a nearby property and alerted police who arrested him at the address soon afterwards. He asked them: ‘Will I go to prison for this?’.

Miss Elizabeth Garcia, defending, said 48-year-old Hussain, aged 48, suffered from bipolar disorder and had a significant mental health history.

The defendant, now living in Washwood Heath Road, Birmingham, pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a female.

He was told by Recorder Jason Macadam: “You have committed this sort of offence on several occasions in the past. You recognise what you have done is wrong but feel there is nothing you can do to stop it. This makes you a high risk of repeating this disgusting behaviour.

“It is at least a distressing nuisance but, more than that, the women do not know what you are going to do afterwards, whether you are going to repeat the offence or worse.

"There will be a lack of supervision if I pass a short custodial sentence and the best way to protect the public is to pass a sentence that corrects your misconception that you cannot help it, because you can.”

Hussain was given a three year high level community order with rehabilitation requirements including the sex offender group programme and a six-month night time curfew.