Two years for model-maker paedophile

A PAEDOPHILE who showed children how to make models of Snow White and Seven Dwarves was jailed today for two years.

A trial heard how the youngsters – aged between five and 14 at the time – were molested at a number of flats in Edinburgh more than 30 years ago.

Some of the abuse took place at a squalid address in Niddrie where Francis Sneddon, 70, and his gay partner were lodging with a family that included at least a dozen children.

In spite of the number living there, one bedroom had been given over to pigeon keeping. The window had been knocked out to let the birds fly in and out and there was no running water in the bathroom.

A victim told the court Sneddon would molest him and then go back to his model making.

Sneddon, now of May Court, Edinburgh, denied the charges against him. He told the High Court in Edinburgh that his hobby was making plaster cast models for a local charity, the Craigmillar Festival Society.

Sneddon claimed his accusers had suffered sex abuse at the hands of others and, with the passage of time, had become confused and were falsely blaming him.