Gay Pedophile Gets 18 Years

(Northern Ireland) In September 2007, two male homosexual lovers were convicted in Reading Crown Court of molesting a young boy, starting when he was an infant and lasting until he was four and one-half years old.

Former soldier Alan Howitt (pictured), 39, and mannequin-dresser James Rae, 34, persuaded a female friend to allow them to babysit her son. The men were found guilty of repeated sex crimes against the boy.

The depraved pair, from Ridgeborough Court in Castle Hill, Central Reading, took it in turns to perform sex acts on the child with Howitt also forcing the boy to do the same to him, the court heard.

The court earlier heard Howitt and Rae had known the boy's mother for several years and may have begun the abuse when the child was just six months old.

Speaking about her son, now aged eight, the mother added: "He is a happy little boy and has been doing very well at school. 

"He is pleased they are not going to come out for a long time and they are never going to hurt him again.

"I thought it may have affected him but it is difficult to know if that will change as he grows up and I am scared and frightened of childcare and leaving him and his brother with anyone.

"I am so relieved that at last it is over. It has taken over three years for this case to be tried and come to sentence and has been so hard on all the family. You see this kind of thing in the news but you never think it will happen to your family. I often wonder why this happened to my child."

Judge Christopher Critchlow sentenced Howitt to a minimum of 18 years for seven counts of indecent assault, sexual assault by penetration, sexual assault on a child and perjury along with six counts in relation to the making, possessing and distributing of indecent images.

Rae was sentenced to 12 years in prison earlier this year after admitting to videotaping Howitt abusing the boy as he simulated sex with the four-year-old and performed a sex act off-camera.