Paedophile old man of Southampton imprisoned after travelling to the Philippines 

Paedophile Michael John Ide, 79, flouted travel restrictions by visiting the country "where children are highly at risk" without telling police.

By Edward Era Barbacena 

A pensioner sex offender who flew to the Philippines to see his 38-year-old 'girlfriend' told a judge his jail sentence "ain't fair".

Paedophile Michael John Ide, 79, flouted travel restrictions by visiting the country "where children are highly at risk" without telling police.

As Judge Gary Burrell KC jailed him for 16 months, Ide shouted 'no' from the dock.

“It ain’t fair. I will lose my home,” he protested.

As he was taken out of court, he also said: “I have got animals. I have a fridge full of food.”

Ide, of Burgoyne Road, Southampton failed to comply with his notification requirements four times, the court heard.

In 1998 he was jailed for 30 months for gross indecency with a child and indecent assault on a child and ordered to register as a sex offender for life.

But when his offender manager visited him on June 30 this year, Ide was found to have a passport he had not told police about.

An examination of the document confirmed he had secretly travelled to foreign countries twice, once in 2017 and once in 2023.

Prosecuting, Keely Harvey told Southampton Crown Court that in 2017, Ide had visited his “girlfriend” in the Philippines who was 38 at the time.

Police also found a Facebook account he had been using for "a considerable period of time" without notifying officers.

Mitigating, Annabel Hazlitt said that for 19 years “when he had a more stable home life”, Ide had stuck to his notification requirements.

She also said Ide he has had a number of operations and health issues.

However, Judge Burrell, sitting as a deputy circuit judge, said the sex offender is “beyond help”.

“You did something that is serious, and you knew what you were doing at the time because those breaches show quite a long period of non-compliance.

“You’re going to a country where it is known that children are highly at risk.

“The prosecution says, and I think there is merit in it, that the country that you went to is such that there was a risk of very serious harm to children from you because you have this problem that hasn’t really gone away.

“You like children.

“I don’t think a community sentence would be appropriate for you.”

The court heard his girlfriend’s child was not present when Ide was visiting.