A woman who worked as a care officer at a children’s home had a "relationship" with a teenage boy that lived there, a court heard.
Alysha Friel appeared at Liverpool Crown Court on Thursday after pleading guilty to six counts of being an adult abusing a position of trust by engaging in sexual activity with a boy aged between 13 and 17, and four counts of being an adult abusing a position of trust causing or inciting sexual activity with a boy aged between 13 and 17.
Callum Ross, prosecuting, detailed that in 2019, Friel, then-23, worked as a residential child care officer at a Children’s Home, and the victim was a looked after teenager at that facility. He said: “The complainant disclosed that in 2020, the complainant and the defendant began flirting with each other.
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“They then would go to the cinema and the complainant described how they had kissed on multiple occasions. The complainant disclosed that he believed they were - to use his words - in a relationship.”
Mr Ross told the court that 26-year-old Friel and the victim engaged in sexual activity with each other on multiple occasions, over the course of months. Text messages between Friel and the teenager were also referenced in court, including discussions of their sexual intercourse, feelings towards each other, and mention of Friel “wanting” the victim.
The victim also told the defendant he was “addicted” to her. The pair went on holiday together, but weeks after returning, the victim told Friel he “didn’t want to do this anymore” and asked her to quit her job.
Mr Ross said the victim told another member of staff at the facility that he had engaged in sexual activity with the defendant, and showed a number of Instagram messages between the two of them. The children’s home called the police and Friel was suspended with immediate effect.
During an interview with police, the mum-of-two immediately admitted the sexual activity. Kenneth Heckle, defending, detailed that his client was pregnant for at least some of the offending, and was isolated within the home due to coronavirus.
He said: “Using my own words, there was somewhat of a perfect storm if you like, with regard to her own vulnerabilities and problems and then coronavirus, and then she ended up in that bubble. We have a frightened 26-year-old defendant in the dock.”
Mr Heckle said Friel of Grangemoor, Runcorn, was from a hard-working and supportive family, and that he believed the courts would never see her again. He also said that Friel has had no contact with the victim in the three years since the incident, and though he did try to contact her soon after her arrest, she ignored him and told police immediately.
He added she clearly showed deep and genuine remorse, and was “not the type of defendant we expect to see in these courts”. In sentencing, Judge Robert Trevor-Jones said: “You were 23, he was vulnerable to the extent that he was the subject of a full care order, and had been placed at that home.
“You initiated a wholly inappropriate relationship with him. “He had become somewhat infatuated or obsessed with you and believed you were in a relationship, but he then ended it.”
Judge Trevor-Jones described the relationship as the “corruption of what was a young and vulnerable victim.” Friel was sentenced to 20 months imprisonment, suspended for 18 months, and ordered to complete 35 rehabilitation days plus 100 hours of unpaid work.
She was also told to pay £300 in prosecution costs, the victim surcharge, and will be subject to notification order.
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