A PERVERTED hotel manager who set up a secret camera in a bedroom to watch a couple having sex was jailed for six months today.

Clarence Birkbeck, who admitted to having a "healthy fascination" with sex, placed the spy camera between two of the wardrobes to focus on the four-poster bed.

The camera was then linked to his bedroom at the Kastle Court guesthouse in Newcomen Terrace, Redcar, for his enjoyment.

Birkbeck, who denied a charge of voyeurism, was convicted after a trial at Langbaurgh East Magistrates Court in Guisborough in May.


Drugs

During the trial the 67-year-old admitted placing the camera in one of the bedrooms but claimed it was only to see if a couple were taking drugs - not to watch them having sex.

Prosecutor Anne Mitchell said Birkbeck, who runs the hotel with his long-term partner Caroline Tait, deliberately set up the camera to focus on the bed to spy on the couples activities.

"Sexual activity took place and then the woman saw a camera in a gap near the wardrobe and the police were called and Mr Birkbeck was arrested on suspicion of voyeurism," she told the court.

While giving evidence, the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, repeatedly broke down when asked to give details of her relationship with her boyfriend, and their activities at the hotel.

She said: "The room had a four-poster bed, which was bolted to the wall, which we found strange.

"We had a bit of an argument, there were raised voices and then we made it up and were intimate.

"I was sat on the edge of the bed next morning and in the gap near the wardrobe I said jokingly to (her boyfriend) 'It looks like a camera'.

"But when he moved the wardrobe there was a camera pointing at the four-poster bed and it was connected up.

"My boyfriend phoned the police and I felt destroyed."

The couple, who had stayed in the same room the previous week, rang to book a room on the morning of November 30 last year for two nights.

But, after spending one night there, the woman was horrified to discover the surveillance device screwed to the wall in the gap between two wardrobes.

The police arrived that evening and were shown the camera by the couple, which was switched on and had black tape covering the LED light.

After talking to Birkbeck, they were taken to his bedroom - directly below the couple - to watch the live link, which was being recorded on video.

Police seized "quite an extensive collection" of pornographic DVDs and sex toys during the search of the guesthouse.

However, there was no evidence to suggest Birkbeck had recorded anything sexual between the couple.

Birkbeck claimed in court that he watched only ten minutes of the live link because he believed the man and woman were smoking marijuana.

No drugs were found in the room and the couple were not suspected of taking any illegal substances, the court was told.

Jailing Birkbeck for six months, Maureen Rider, chairman of the bench, said he had installed the camera for his own "sexual gratification".

Birkbeck was also placed on the sex offenders register for seven years.

Mr Dixon said Birkbeck intended to appeal against both the sentence and the conviction before a Crown Court judge and applied for bail until that hearing.

The magistrates refused and ordered that the defendant begin his sentence immediately