A former yacht club manager sent a video of himself masturbating to a nine-year-old boy. He also asked the young boy for naked photographs.
Clifford Taylor, 40, was convicted of two counts of sexually communicating with a child, following a trial at Cardiff Crown Court. He denied the offences and continues to maintain his innocence despite the verdicts.
A sentencing hearing on Monday heard the former RNLI volunteer and former general manager at Penarth Yacht Club had a previous conviction for blackmail, after he extorted €12,000 from a man he had sex with by threatening to send intimate photos and videos to his wife.
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Sentencing, Recorder Greg Bull KC said: "I am wholly satisfied you knew full well from the moment you began communicating with him he was a child. The photographs that were exchanged to you from him made it perfectly plain, the body of a nine-year-old boy would have wholly different to an adult man.
"You still lied to the jury and yourself about the appreciation of what you've done. You have no empathy with the child.... You show signs of being a sexual predator. You used sex to entrap another man, an adult in a compromising situation you then used to blackmail him."
The court also heard Taylor told the boy not to tell his mother about their conversations in March 2020. The victim now requires counselling as a result of the offences.
In mitigation, the court was told the defendant, of Esplanade, Penarth, is originally from Ireland and was isolated during the Covid pandemic. He acknowledged his alcohol intake during this period was excessive.
Taylor was sentenced to a total of 30 months imprisonment. He was also made subject to a Sexual Harm Prevention Order and sex offender notification requirements indefinitely.
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