A SHERIFF has hit out at the Crown Office for limiting the maximum prison sentence she could impose on a serial child abuser to one year.
Sheriff Elizabeth McFarlane told 37-year-old David Tannock that he deserved to be jailed for four years after being found guilty of repeatedly beating a baby from the day she was born until she was three years old. He was also convicted of repeatedly attacking a second, older girl.
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The assaults took place at a property in Newmilns, Ayrshire, between January 2012 and August last year.
Sheriff McFarlane complained that she had been restricted from jailing Tannock for longer as he had been prosecuted on a less serious “summary complaint”, rather than a solemn complaint, meaning that the
maximum sentence available to her was 12 months.
Commenting on the case as Tannock appeared for sentencing at Kilmarnock Sheriff Court, Sheriff McFarlane said: “I’ve been doing this job a long time, Mr Tannock.
“I’ve never heard anything quite so chilling as the recording of the three-year-old girl screaming at you not to hit her.
“The children had to come to court to give evidence against you and spoke of numerous assaults.
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“I am shocked this was raised on summary complaint – the most I can jail you for is a year. You deserve four years, Mr Tannock, one for every year you abused these children.”
Tannock portrayed himself as a loving and caring family man in a series of Facebook photographs of himself with his children.
However, the court heard that he was a man with a short temper who had repeatedly pushed his older victim to the ground, grabbing her by the hair and pulling her, leaving her injured.
He was also found guilty of assaulting the younger girl from the day she was born.
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A Crown Office spokesman defended the decision to prosecute him in a way which meant he could receive at most 12 months behind bars.
He said: “We note the sentence and the comments of the Sheriff.
“Decisions on what court to prosecute a case in are taken after careful consideration of all the relevant facts and circumstances of a case.”
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