'You can't cure paedophiles'

THEY may be spoken by a judge, but the damning words could well have come from Peter Kinsley's own lips. In his book, when paedophile Frederick Mason has been found guilty of his crime, the judge makes it clear that no excuse will ever mitigate what he has done. You almost hear his steely voice as, with the courtroom hushed and still, he makes this haunting, powerful speech:

"Frederick Mason, you have been found guilty of a most foul and disgusting crime, the rape and causing of grievous and actual bodily harm to a child of nine years. The British public, and the citizens of other countries where there is a prevalence of this crime of paedophile attack are sick at heart at the rise in the number of sex attacks on innocent children. To demonstrate the disgust of all parents everywhere, and all right-minded citizens, I intend to make an example of you. You will go to prison for 20 years..."

If these are author Peter's convictions then it is probably fair to say that they are shared by many others. With Madeleine McCann's shock disappearance and the publicity that has followed, children's safety is a subject that is clearly at the fore. Of course, the threat of paedophiles has always been on parents' minds, and there's no evidence that the threat is any worse today, yet Peter will admit his book has been incredibly well timed.

"I sent it to the publisher about a year ago so it's just a matter of luck that it's come out now," says the 72-year-old, who lives in London but is originally from Stanley, Co Durham. "It's based on actual material - although it's done as a novel, all the background is genuine."

A hard-edged book with gritty language, To Catch A Paedophile is direct. It follows each of the main characters - the paedophile Fred, the detective inspector and the reporter in the case - and gives each one a personal voice. This may be fine for DI Hunter and the journalist, Ben Wagstaff, but when it comes to putting words into the mouth of pervert Fred the whole thing seems quite disconcerting. Is Peter conscious of the fact that readers may well take offence?

"It is shocking. It especially would shock women," he concedes. "What I've actually found is that even if I mention that I've got a new book coming out and mention the title, women take a backward step. Even the word shocks them."

Yet, when it comes to how he's handled this most sensitive of subjects Peter argues he's been right. "I'm a tough old newspaper man and I'm not sentimental about it," he says. "I've written it as things happen. I'll see what the reviews say about it but you've got to give people the clear facts."

And he should know them better than most. For years a Fleet Street crime reporter, Peter covered many cases and says the plot line of the book is based on articles he wrote. "I just drew on all these stories I'd covered and made a composite picture," he says. "I actually met the little girl in the book, who had her memory brought back by a forensic psychologist. It was my story that had the paedophile arrested."

Though he describes himself as tough, the case quite clearly made an impact. When he recalls the victim's plight his sense of outrage is still keen. "That little girl couldn't sit on her father's knee for four months after the attack," says Peter. "A girl that age's life is ruined by this - she never trusts men again. These guys ruin these children's lives. They serve a sentence then come out of jail but the victim serves a sentence all their life."

Not quite politically correct - he speaks of padeophiles as 'nonces' - Peter favours harsher treatment. He doesn't feel that new ideas like so-called 'chemical castration' are ever likely to succeed. "The main thing is I just don't think they can be cured," he says. "These people have to give permission for a doctor to administer the chemical under the Human Rights Act, but what I say is a man who attacks a young girl and ruins her life forfeits his rights. We have to keep them in jail under what used to be called Her Majesty's Pleasure, which was basically saying 'you will never get out'."

Despite his feelings on this subject, when he looks back on his career it is predominantly with fondness. He started out while in his teens on the Newcastle Daily Mail then, after stints at other papers, moved on to Fleet Street and to crime reporting. While he was still just in his 20s, Peter joined the Daily Express and was assigned to Scotland Yard as an accredited reporter.

"On each newspaper, two crime reporters were issued with a card which said Scotland Yard on the front," he says. "These cards were magic."

The card gave Peter privileged access to some famous names in crime - he met both Lucky Luciano, the hardened gangster, while in Naples, and also murderer Donald Hume, whom he describes as "very shifty". It was a fascinating time and one he's happy to revisit. "It was interesting for a young man in London meeting all these people," he says. "Imagine mixing with villains like that."

But Peter tired of London life and went to live in France instead, where as the head of his own business, he continued meeting stars - he's gone drinking with Oscar Wilde's son and, in an interview at The Ritz, got into Shirley Bassey's bed when she complained about the cold. "I started an agency in the South of France and that's where I met most of the famous people," he says. "Then I came back when I was 28 and wrote a novel in London, which was bought by Hollywood for $50,000, although the film was never made."

Since then he's written 12 more books, including one, with colleague Frank Smyth, about the hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper. What Peter writes is what he knows - the life he's lived and his career - and while it may not always please it's never likely to be dull. "All the books basically have drawn on my experiences - and I have had some interesting ones," he says.

To Catch A Paedophile by Peter Kinsley, pictured, (Amherst Publishing, £16.99)