A serial sex pest secretly captured 40 hours of footage showing a woman undressing after breaking into her bedroom and hiding a spy-cam in a vase of flowers, a court has heard.
Peeping tom Andrew Thomas spent six months filming the unsuspecting pensioner after concealing his camera phone inside a vase at the foot of her bed. Thomas, who carried out a similar crime on an oil rig a decade ago, was caught when the horrified victim discovered the device while rearranging her artificial flowers.
The camera phone’s memory was found to hold more than 40 hours of intimate recordings showing the 65-year-old woman in varying states of undress. The 49-year-old groundskeeper was later discovered sneaking around inside the property by the woman’s daughter and her partner.
Thomas, a convicted sex offender, confessed what he had done and admitted having romantic feelings for his victim. Thomas admitted covertly recording his victim at her home in Perthshire from January 29 to July 29, 2023. Fiscal depute Rachel Hill told Perth Sheriff Court the woman lived alone in a small village near Thomas’s home town of Pitlochry.
“This is a small rural and close-knit community where most locals know one another,” she said. “Many residents often leave their homes insecure. She considered the accused to be a friend and they regularly socialised together with shared coffees, alcoholic drinks and dog walks.”
The court heard that in December 2022, Thomas told the woman he had “deeper romantic feelings towards her” but she did not share them. Ms Hill said: “On July 29 2023, the complainer was in the process of rearranging artificial flowers in a vase at the foot of her bed.
“She became aware of an object within the vase, which had a camera lens pointing in the general direction of her bed.
“Upon further investigation, this was found to be a mobile phone attached to the inside of the vase, connected to a power bank also inside the vase.” The device was described as a white iPhone, stuck on using Velcro, protruding from the vase by about an inch. The fiscal depute said: “It could be seen from the screen that a video recording was taking place.
“It appeared to have been running for a period of 40 hours and 45 minutes.” When her daughter looked at the photo gallery, she found 34 files. Ms Hill said: “She could see from the thumbnails that there were intimate images of her mother in various stages of undress and also while naked.”
The following day, Thomas crept into the woman’s home shortly after she left for church. Her daughter and her partner, who were nearby, saw him at the property. They found the back door unlocked and open. Ms Hill said a key, stored in the porch, had been used to get inside. As they entered, Thomas appeared from a hallway door.
Asked what he was doing, he paused for some time then eventually said he was there for a hedge trimmer battery, sometimes kept indoors instead of the garage. Thomas was told he had no business being in the house and he agreed to leave. Police went to his home later that day.
“He openly admitted the offence, stating he had entered the property whilst it was unlocked and placed the camera phone inside the vase. He said he had returned on numerous occasions to replace the battery but couldn’t say how many times. He confirmed that he had romantic feelings towards the complainer and said the recordings were captured for a sexual purpose.
“He admitted he had gone to the house that day to check the phone but had been interrupted.” When cautioned and charged, he replied: “Guilty”. Sheriff Alison McKay placed Thomas on the sex offenders register and deferred sentence for background reports.
She said: “You will appreciate that this offence is a concerning one, not least because you have a previous conviction that appears to be analogous.”
In 2014, the former offshore worker was handed an unpaid work order after he was caught secretly filming a female colleague showering in her cabin on a North Sea rig. In that case, Aberdeen Sheriff Court heard how he sneaked into his victim’s cabin and hid his mobile in her bathroom.
It was concealed behind a white sheet of paper and set to record footage of her as she washed, but she spotted the hidden device.
Speaking outside court at the time, she said: “How could he do that to me? It makes my flesh creep to think what he might have done with the videos.”
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