A PERVERTED Beith babysitter who exposed himself to an underage girl on a web cam from another room in his house while he was looking after her has been spared jail for abusing her and another youngster. 

Craig Macmillan could have been caged for up to five years for an eight-year reign of terror against her and another youngster.

But on Friday he was put on probation and told to carry out unpaid work - after a sheriff said that was the best way of dealing with him. 

Macmillan’s offences include forcing the girl to look at pornographic images, trying to pay her to perform sex acts on him, and repeatedly sexually assaulting another youngster. 

Macmillan, 43, got hold of the first youngster’s email address when she was just 14 and hounded her for a video chat.

She repeatedly ignored his requests but eventually gave in and accepted and, when the video loaded up, was shocked to see the person she was looking at was sitting in the living room of the house she was in - and was the man who was supposed to be looking after her.

When the panicked school pupil closed down the computer to stop seeing an aroused Macmillan, he raced up the stairs, burst in to the room she was in and pounced on her, giving her a hug.

Macmillan, a salesman, maintained his innocence, telling the jury in his trial at Paisley Sheriff Court: “I wouldn’t do that.”

But they didn’t buy his lies and convicted him of forcing the girl to look at a sexual image by exposing himself to her on the web cam, sending her messages asking her to perform sex acts on him and repeatedly sexually assaulting another youngster.

His first victim, who is now 25, said the incident took place at his home in Lyle Crescent, Bishopton, Renfrewshire, sometime between June 2005 and June 2007.

She said she was on a computer in a bedroom in the house when a friend request came through from someone she didn’t know.

She explained: “I got a call on the webcam but I declined at first. They were persistent and kept calling me.

“I accepted and the webcam came up. I saw a grown man. He was just sitting there at first. The camera was halfway down, showing his stomach and below.”

The girl, who can’t be named for legal reasons, said that, although she could not see his face, she knew exactly who she was looking at.

She explained: “He was in [the] living room [of the house I was in] - I recognised the picture on the wall and the TV in the background.

“There was just myself and Craig [Macmillan] in the house at the time.

“I closed it all down, I didn’t know what to feel.

“I sat for a few minutes and then Mr Macmillan came running up the stairs.

“He ran in to [the] room [I was in]. I was still sitting on the computer chair.

“He came right up behind me and gave me a hug and asked if I was okay.

“I felt as if I just had to get out of there. I left, I went out of the room and out of the house.”

The girl said he would leave pornographic images on the computer, with requests for her to perform sex acts on him.

She said one time she walked in to the living room and saw a pornographic picture on a laptop.

“It happened several times. I remember once it was on a computer, a tower PC, in the living room.

“I saw the same image. There was text with it as well, it was bold. 

“[It said], ‘you do this for me and I’ll give you £30 - it will be our secret.”

Macmillan also denied repeatedly sexually assaulting another young girl at the same property between September 2008 and August 2013 - when she was aged between 10 and 14.

But the jury ruled he regularly exposed himself to her, and touched her between 2008 and 2010.

And they also convicted him of repeatedly grabbing her by the body and touching her privates between December 2010 and August 2013.

Macmillan, who was convicted of making sexual remarks to youngsters last February, returned to the dock last week to learn his fate, taking a large holdall with him in case he was jailed. 

Social workers concluded that Macmillan was “a high risk of a sexual reconviction” but Sheriff Spy said not sending him to jail meant he could keep a better eye on him. 

As he placed Macmillan on a Probation Order for three years and told him to carry out 240 hours’ unpaid work, he said: “I am persuaded, on balance, it’s better to keep an eye on you for as long as possible, under the auspices of an order that I can bring back to court, rather than simply send you to jail.”

He also placed Macmillan, of St Inans Drive, on the Sex Offenders Register for three years.