Telford bookie caught in sting by 'paedophile-hunter' Stinson Hunter has sentence revoked

Martin Currier, 52, also a former solicitor, travelled to Nuneaton in the belief he was meeting teenager "Jodie" on May 1, 2013.

But he was instead confronted by Stinson Hunter, a self-styled, paedophile-hunting vigilante, who reported him to the police.

Watch the moment Martin Currier was trapped by vigilante paedophile hunter

Currier, of St Marks Drive, Wellington, was spared a jail term and sentenced to a three-year community order in March this year at Shrewsbury Crown Court.

But that order was revoked at the same court yesterday, despite still having nearly a year-and-a-half still to run.

Judge Jim Tindal admitted it was an "unusual" course of action to take, but opted to do so after hearing from the probation service that Currier had been making excellent progress.

They said he was now an extremely low risk of re-offending.

Currier, addressing the judge, said he had found his work with the probation service "enlightening" and that it had helped address the way he was behaving.

He will still have to sign on the sex offenders register, although he can now also apply to the court for that to be revoked as well.

Currier was originally convicted of one charge of attempting to meet a child following sexual grooming after a trial.

He told a jury he believed "Jodie" to have been seeking his help and he had been trying to boost her confidence.

He claimed he had no intention of doing anything sexual when he agreed to the meeting.

Handing down Currier's sentence of a three-year community order at Shrewsbury Crown Court, Recorder Martin Butterworth said that despite not having "learned any sort of lesson at all", the disgraced bookmaker should undergo a sexual offenders' programme.

He rejected Currier's claims he had been placed under pressure to meet the "girl".

He said: "You, over a period of three weeks, groomed what you thought was a 13-year-old, lonely, vulnerable child, with the intention of having some sexual activity with her, and that was what you set about doing.

You have no one to blame for your situation other than yourself."

Kim Halsall, for Currier, told the court he had received threats to his safety, leading to the police having to provide "safeguards" at his home and workplace.

The solicitor said an immediate custodial sentence would be "devastating" for Currier, who she said had been "shamed and humiliated" and his mother, who suffers from Alzheimer's.

The trial heard Currier had been a solicitor but was struck off in 2002 after he was jailed for fraud having obtained almost £50,000 by forging a client's will.