Sarah's flaw: Mum charged for warning neighbours about local paedophile

A UK mum was charged with data protection offences after revealing the identity of a paedophile who recently moved into the neighbourhood. Photo / Facebook

A UK mother was charged with data protection offences after revealing the identity of a paedophile who recently moved into the neighbourhood.

Claire Varin used Sarah's Law, the UK child sex offender disclosure scheme, in a bid to confirm whether a suspicious man in her street was on the offender list.

Varin had grown suspicious over the man who had been acting strangely around her daughter.

Sarah's Law allowed Varin to confirm the man, named Tom, had previous sex offending convictions but part of the conditions were that she had to sign a non-disclosure form vowing not to inform neighbours.

Varin ignored the conditions, revealing to neighbours Tom had been previously jailed for having child abuse images on his computer.

Despite thinking she had done the right thing, Varin was then charged under the Data Protection Act and faced a potential court trial before it was dropped.

Varin and her family first met Tom when he moved into the street in 2017.

He introduced himself as a trainee barrister and began to chat with their daughters who were 8 and 12 at the time.

The next day he showed up to their front door again asking if the youngest daughter wanting to go berry picking with him.

After Varin's husband declined, the next day Tom showed up with a box of berries for their daughter.

Feeling uncomfortable with Tom's behaviour, she contacted police to find out about his past.

Months later they revealed his previous convictions, which sent Varin's husband into a rage.

He confronted the paedophile days later which landed the pair in trouble. Charges were soon dropped due to lack of evidence.