A JUDGE has praised the level-headed boy whose actions led to a disabled York pensioner being placed on the sex offenders' register for five years.

The teenager alerted his mother to wheelchair-bound George Ernest Jacques' indecent conduct at the front door of his home, York Crown Court heard.

He then gave evidence against the pensioner. Jacques, 77, of Grasmere Grove, Rawcliffe, admitted to the jury he had been totally naked when he opened his front door partially to the boy and gave him sweets, but denied gross indecency towards him.

But the jury believed the boy, who said the retired bank security man had also performed a lewd act and convicted Jacques of the offence. Recorder Roger Thorn QC said that although the teenager was young, he was a "sensible, level-headed chap".

The judge put the 77-year-old on the sex offenders' register for five years and ordered him to do 12 months' community rehabilitation.

He said that the pensioner had sat naked in his wheelchair, knowing the boy was coming, had engaged him in conversation and offered him sweets.

"You must have realised that was wholly inappropriate behaviour", he told Jacques.

He also praised firefighters for their help in getting Jacques in his wheelchair in and out of the courtroom, which does not have access for the disabled.

Updated: 10:35 Saturday, May 25, 2002