EMILIE HEARD, of Newport Street, Dartmouth, writes:

I write in response to the, frankly, abhorrent views expressed by BC Vaughan in these pages on Friday, March 8.

I speak as a parent, a concerned citizen and a woman – who are, according to your correspondent, 'severely marginalised out at the fringes of society'– but I will return to this in a moment.

The basic tenet of the views held by BC Vaughan appears to be that a prolific sex offender was guilty of nothing more than 'botched fumbles'. May I remind readers that these were made by a grown man in his 30s against young girls between six and 15. These are, by any definition, children. Sexual offences of any kind against children of this age cannot be seen as anything other than the most horrific of crimes.

This was not a 16-year-old sleeping with his 15-year-old girlfriend and getting caught, this was a grown man assaulting children. I dread to consider what is in the mind of a person who seeks to excuse this behaviour in others.

I do not want to wade hip deep into the debate about papers revealing the identities of offenders before trial, except to say that we do not require our press, at any level, to try to convict people accused of any crime. We have a justice system to do that for us.

Finally back to your misguided correspondent. Not content with attempting to excuse paedophilia he – I assume this must be a man judging by the comments made about women – goes on to dismiss 'women's rights groups' and refer to women as marginalised. We are not. We, in fact, make up half the country's population and we do not need to ask or beg for any 'rights' as they are already enshrined in law and common decency.

The meaning of the last part of BC Vaughan's letter evades me no matter how often I read it. He is somehow trying to link adults trying to stop other adults from sexually abusing children, with some imagined level of ignorance about sex in younger people. I think it is a very spurious argument to make that somehow protection leaves children ignorant.

Obviously this is not the case and no right-thinking person could possibly agree with it.

Cases like Phil Walton's are deeply, deeply upsetting and disturbing, especially to those of us who were young girls in this sphere of influence at the time. To in any way imply that it is excusable or a miscarriage of justice is, frankly, disgusting and not worthy of any further contemplation.