A JUDGE said he was taking an "exceptional" course when he allowed a teenager to walk free for a sexual assault on a 12-year-old girl.

Matthew McCormick kissed the child on a playing field in Hartlepool in front of her brother and sister and his own brother last year.

He was found guilty of sexual assault after a four-day trial at Teesside Crown Court in April, and returned today (Wednesday) to be sentenced.

The 19-year-old was given a 12-month community order with supervision and banned from having contact with under-16s for five years.

The judge, Recorder Tahir Khan, QC, also ordered that the teenager should sign on the sex offenders' register for the next five years.

He told McCormick, of West View Road, Hartlepool: "There are features in your case which justify me dealing with you in an exceptional way."

The court heard that he suffers from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and has borderline learning difficulties.

A probation report said: "He is not dangerous or malicious, rather a troubled young man with limited intellect and comprehension."

When McCormick kissed the girl, she was too scared to tell him to stop, after he said: "I've got ADHD and I've not had my tablets."

Christine Egerton, mitigating, said the teenager - 18 at the time of the offence last April - is closely monitored by his mother.

Mr Recorder Khan told Miss Egerton: "Unusually, a community order with supervision is appropriate in a case like this.

"It seems to me the public is better served by him serving a sentence in the community .

"This offence was marked by immaturity and impulsivity, it seems to me, and custody would not be the right way of dealing with him in the circumstances."

The probation report said McCormick would be vulnerable in prison, and the judge added: "It is not necessary to send you to custody to protect the public, in particularly children, from unwanted attentions from you.

"I am persuaded that the last thing I should do is lock you up. It would not be right, in my judgement, to do that, although nobody should be under any illusion that committing a sexual assault on a 12-year-old girl is anything but serious."