A CHILD sex abuser stalked his victim after she contacted him in an attempt to come to terms with her past.

Bolton Crown Court heard how Steven Harper, from Horwich, was jailed for 54 months in 2000 after committing a series of sex offences against two girls as young as six in the 1990s.

But Guy Mathieson, prosecuting, told how one of his victims, now a young woman, struggled to deal with the aftermath of the crime despite counselling and treatment for anxiety — so she contacted him in order to set up a meeting.

"She believed he would be able to give her, in the American term, some closure," said Mr Mathieson.

However, he said the two-hour meeting in October 2013 did not go as she hoped.

"She did not get the answers she wanted or felt entitled to," said Mr Mathieson.

Instead Harper began bombarding her with text messages, changing his mobile phone when she blocked his number and did not respond and even set up a Facebook account under a false name to keep in contact with her.

But by May 2014 the harassment became more sinister, with Harper hand delivering sexually explicit and disturbing letters and poems to her home in the middle of the night.

In one letter he even told her he would have liked to have raped her at their meeting.

His frightened victim contacted police and handed them his correspondence.

Mr Mathieson said after his arrest 53-year-old Harper immediately sent her another letter "full of bile and vitriol".

He added that the victim deeply regretted having contacted Harper.

In a statement she told the court: "If I had known this was going to happen I would never, in a million years, have met up with him."

David Bentley said Harper, of no fixed address, had become fixated with the woman and his marriage had broken up as a result.

The woman had not met him face to face after the October 2013 meeting, but Mr Bentley said Harper had hoped to pursue a relationship with her.

However, he accepted that the contact had "developed towards a crescendo of vile language".

Harper pleaded guilty to stalking and perverting the course of justice.

Sentencing him to 29 months in prison Judge Graeme Smith described the offending as "highly unusual and disturbing".

Judge Smith expressed sympathy with Harper's victim and granted a restraining order banning the abuser from contacting her in future.

"For the best of motives she took a step which resulted in terrible consequences she could not have envisaged," he added.