A 52-year-old man with a history of sexually assaulting young men has been spared prison after a judge took a “merciful approach” to his fifth similar offence.

Peter Macmillan-Collins wept in the dock at Bradford Crown Court last month when a jury convicted him of molesting a 23-year-old man in a camper van on the moors above Baildon.

Yesterday Macmillan-Collins, of Church View, Kayley Hill, Skipton, was sentenced to 12 months’ imprisonment suspended for two years and ordered to attend a sex offender treatment programme.

He must also do 100 hours’ unpaid work for the community, comply with a three-month curfew order and be supervised by the probation service.

During the trial, the young man told the jury he and two male friends drank alcohol and smoked cannabis with Macmillan-Collins after he drove them high on to the moors.

The victim fell asleep on a bunk bed and woke to find the defendant performing a sexual act on him.

Macmillan-Collins pretended to be asleep but the young man knew what he had done and hit and kicked him.

He went outside and picked up a road sign to throw through the camper van window but it was driven away.

He told how he chased after it before curling up in a ball on the ground and crying.

Macmillan-Collins at first told the police nothing had happened.

Confronted by scientific evidence, he changed his story and insisted the sex act was consensual.

Prosecutor Nick Askins told the court yesterday that Macmillan-Collins had four previous convictions for indecently assaulting young men.

He was conditionally discharged in 1986 by Chichester magistrates for sexual assault on a male. The next year he was at Chichester Crown Court for two further similar offences.

Mr Askins said he molested an 18-year-old man in a layby and a 17-year-old in the back of a van.

In 1989, he was sentenced by Southampton magistrates for sexually assaulting a 16-year-old boy on a train.

Judge Potter said Macmillan-Collins committed a “disgusting act” on his latest victim.

But he was a devoted carer to his seriously ill mother and his probation officer thought he would harm himself if sent to prison.

Judge Potter reserved any breach of the suspended sentence order to himself, warning Macmillan-Collins that if he came back to court he would know his merciful approach had been rejected.