Johnstone man convicted of bedding underage girl after grooming her spared jail

Kyle Cummings, 22, sobbed in the dock at Paisley Sheriff Court earlier this year as he was convicted of having sex with the minor – and warned he faced jail for the offence.

But on Tuesday he was spared a spell behind bars, after a sheriff was told the 15-year-old is now being investigated amid claims she may have lied in court to get Cummings convicted.

Cummings denied having consensual sex with the schoolgirl while she was over the age of 13 but under the age of 16, in breach of Section 28 of the Sexual Offences (Scotland) Act 2009, and went on trial over the claims earlier this year.

The girl, who wore her school uniform while giving evidence, said she was groomed by Cummings after meeting him through his job at a fairground.

She said he got her mobile phone number after meeting her at the fair and then began to go on trips with her.

She started going from her home to Cummings’ home in Johnstone’s Cartside Avenue to spend the evenings with him.

She told the court she would get the train from Inverclyde to Paisley Gilmour Street station, then a train to Johnstone, and a taxi to Cummings’ home.

And during a trip to his home on October 27 last year, two days after she told him she was sitting through a school English lesson, the girl, who is now above the age of consent, said they had sex.

Cummings did not give evidence in the case and claimed through his solicitor that he did not know the girl was only 15.

Sentence was deferred for background reports and Cummings returned to the dock on Tuesday to be sentenced.

Defence solicitor Gordon Ritchie said the case had taken a strange twist, due to comments posted on social media following Cummings’ conviction.

The lawyer explained: “Some events have taken place since the trial.

“Some two days after there was a posting on one of the local newspapers’ Facebook pages with a news report about the trial.

“Following that there is, what commonly takes place now, a number of postings in response to this newspaper report online.

“There is a message from the complainer, or someone purporting to be the complainer, that says, ‘haha I lied yet you were still proven f****** guilty’, and a further one, ‘you have been proven guilty so enjoy jail, you might see my dad while you’re in there haha’.

“On the face of it this appears to be an admission by the complainer of perjury.

“This case hinged entirely on the complainer’s credibility and reliability.

“It’s a rather unusual situation.”

Sheriff Susan Sinclair, who convicted Cummings, replied: “It is a matter for them [the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service] and the police to find out what’s been posted and the veracity of it.

“I have to proceed upon the basis of the conviction and the evidence available to me at the time.

“Anything that happens subsequent to that is different.”

Mr Ritchie then asked for leniency for Cummings, said it could be distinguished from other cases where grooming is involved.

The lawyer said: “She was a few months short of her 16th birthday.

“This is not an extremely young child being groomed and exploited by a much older male.

“She appears to have been sexually experienced.

“This was clearly a relationship she was advancing and was happy to be in.

“There is no indication and no suggestion that anything was other than consensual and that she was a knowing and willing participant in everything that took place.”

After hearing that Cummings had lost his job at the fairground where he worked as a result of publicity stemming from his case, Sheriff Sinclair spared him jail.

She could have jailed him for up to 12 months for the offence but opted to place him on a Community Payback Order.

She told Cummings he has six months to carry out 200 hours’ unpaid work and will be supervised by social workers and be on the sex offenders’ register for a period of nine months.

As she did so, she said: “What might have happened online since is not a matter for me but a matter for the authorities in due course. She was a few months short of her 16th birthday and was a willing participant but the law is there to protect girls from themselves. You were old enough and responsible enough to know better.”