Sex offender accused of attending a baby shower and using Tinder

Gary Savage was refused bail over allegations he defied a ban on contact with children by going to the family gathering in Co Antrim.

The 37-year-old is further accused of using a fake name and flouting restrictions on his activity through using online dating app Tinder.

Savage, with an address on the Antrim Road in Belfast, faces three charges of breaching a Sexual Offences Prevention Order (SOPO).

One count relates to allegations he attended a baby shower at an address in Larne on September 1 last year. His partner at the time was said to have invited him to the event being hosted by her family.

Defence lawyers have claimed she knew about his background, and that children present were not in the same age category his previous offences related to.

Savage is accused of two further violations of his SOPO by using a false name the previous month, and accessing Tinder in January this year.

Fake details had been provided because his girlfriend was embarrassed and didn’t want her family to know who she was seeing, according to the defence.

Mr Justice Humphreys was told Savage intends to contest the charges and should be presumed innocent. But he held that previous breaches of a SOPO undermined any confidence in the accused abiding by any bail conditions.

“What is clear from the criminal record is that this man is an incorrigible offender,” the judge said.

Denying Savage’s application to be released, he observed: “We have allegations of using a false name, being at a baby shower where there were many young people under the age of 18 present, and contacting a partner on Tinder in flagrant breach of the Order.

“Those are very serious matters… the risk this man poses is such that I could not conceive of how I could release him on bail.”