LEEDS, UK (5 May 2006) -- A SCUBA diving boss who secretly filmed a schoolgirl and two women getting undressed has been ordered to do 200 hours unpaid work for the community. David Hepworth, the owner and manager of Leeds-based scuba diving club Bear Divers, was also given a 12-month supervision order and ordered to pay £500 prosecution costs when he appeared for sentence yesterday at Leeds Crown Court. Hepworth, 36, of Lees Hall Road, Thornhill Lees, Dewsbury, was convicted by a jury last month on three charges of voyeur-ism by recording another person doing a private act in order to gain sexual gratification. His claim that he had installed the camera to catch a thief was rejected. The jurors heard his filming was discovered when a BBC Look North cameraman rented a waterproof dive camera from the Bear Divers' base in Stanningley Road, Armley, Leeds. He found footage still on it which showed a woman trying on a wetsuit – as well as Hepworth's face when he set up the camera. When police officers went to the dive shop they discovered a camera on a shelf in a classroom that doubled up as a changing room. A film inside showed a 13-year-old girl and two women aged 26 and 39 undressing on two dates last July. Fiona Dix-Dyer, representing Hepworth, said he still maintained he had not installed the camera for sexual reasons. But she said his business had been destroyed as a result. The Professional Association of Diving Instructors had now expelled him and withdrawn his certificate, she said. That meant he could no longer teach or instruct scuba diving and he was faced with either selling what was left of his business, which he had started from scratch when he was 22, or going into liquidation. Ms Dix-Dyer said the loss of his career and business was already a severe punishment. | | David Hepworth: Fighting to avoid bankruptcy after being convicted of voyeurism. He was also desperately trying to avoid being made bankrupt since his wife, a mortgage advisor, would then lose her job since she could not be associated with a bankrupt. Sentencing Hepworth, Judge Trevor Kent-Jones said he had in effect lured his victims into a filming position in a room where the video camera had already been set up. The judge accepted there was no direct touching or suggestion of the films being made available to anyone else which would have aggravated the position. But he said Hepworth had deceived the complainants by filming when they were entitled to expect privacy, causing them humiliation when they found out. After the case, one of the women said he had betrayed the trust placed in him and deserved his punishment. "It was quite scary in some respects to find out what he had done," she said. "I am glad he will not be teaching diving again." Hepworth must also register as a sex offender for five years. SOURCE - Yorkshire Post |
