A SEX offender riddled with guilt fled from his North-East home to Africa and left a “next of kin box” along with a letter saying he wanted to control his own death.

Suicidal paedophile Jeffrey Parker is said to have bought some rope to take his own life, but ended up boarding the Eurostar and heading to France, a court heard.

The 52-year-old Teessider made his way to Barcelona and then on to Morocco where he worked in bars and hotel receptions – close to families with children on holiday.

He stayed away for almost eight months before he came back to seek medical attention for kidney stones, and was arrested at Heathrow Airport on November 25 last year.

Considered a high-risk offender, Parker was visited by police public protection officers every three months before he staged his disappearing act on April 1.

He had emptied his bank account of £160 and taken out travel insurance after his change of heart over his suicide plans, a judge sitting at Teesside Crown Court was told.

Parker’s cross-Channel trip flouted a Sexual Offences Prevention Order imposed in 2011 after his conviction for sexual activity with a child and having indecent images.

He admitted four charges of breaching sex offender notification requirements by failing to make contact with police or tell them of his travels, whereabouts or new passport.

Prosecutor Jenny Haigh told Judge Sean Morris how police found he had left the next of kin box and letter when they visited his home last spring and found him missing.

Alex Bousfield, mitigating, said Parker, of no fixed abode, was “racked with guilt” for his previous sex offending - and that he had been a victim of abuse himself.

Mr Bousfield said he fled the UK when he encountered his childhood tormentor, and found work which he carried out without pay, in return for his lodgings.

The lawyer told Judge Morris: “He tells me he hates himself for what he did. He can’t understand why he did it. He can’t bear to think about it.

“He does seem to be somebody who has learned from what he did and has no intention or interest in repeating that kind of behaviour.

“He just wanted to get away. It wasn’t really until he was abroad he thought about what he had done and it was too late to do anything about it.

“He’d gone out without any great plan about how he was going to keep himself. He worked in receptions, bars and hotels. He was able to provide services to them without pay but in exchange for keep.

“There’s no suggestion of any further offending while he was out there. He was working with adults. There’s no suggestion of anything untoward.”

Judge Morris said the offences were worrying and showed planning, and added: “We only have your say-so for what happened out there [in Morocco].

“I understand you were working in bars and hotels, places where people go on holiday with their children. I take the view the likelihood is if you could have, you would have stayed away.”

Parker, who was locked up in 2013 for an earlier breach of the order, was jailed for 12 months.