A man who was caught with thousands of images of schoolgirls' feet has been spared jail. Samuel Tobin, 31, had over 10,000 images and 400 videos of feet on his phone - many of underage girls. Prosecutors said police also uncovered a USB stick containing even more images, divided into folders titled "flats", "loafers", "flip-flops", "sandals" and "schoolgirls".
Court hears of 'alarming' offences
Prosecutor Hollie Davies told Basildon Crown Court another 28 USB sticks are still "awaiting further assessment". Tobin was said to have camped outside a school taking pictures of girls in uniform. Branding the offences "alarming", sentencing judge Peter Clark warned Tobin he was in "the last chance saloon" before sparing him a prison sentence.
None of the images were indecent, but they all appeared to have been taken without the subjects' knowledge and for sexual gratification. Tobin, who has repeatedly been brought before the court for similar offences, sat with his head in his hands in the dock of Basildon Crown Court on Wednesday (September 23).
History of breaches
He was first slapped with a sexual risk order in 2021, "to help manage the defendant's sexual preoccupation with feet and shoes," said Miss Davies. The court order specifically banned him from taking images of people's feet without their consent. He has breached the order three times, in 2023, 2025 and 2026.
When Essex Police carried out a random spot check of the 31-year-old's home in Westcliff, Essex, in June, Tobin was sat using his computer in his bedroom. He "grabbed hold of his phone and is said to have begun fussing with it, pressing buttons, before the officer took the phone from him," said the prosecutor. The officer found the photo gallery empty, but in the deleted photos folder there were approximately 10,000 images and 444 videos. "Looking through those images, the majority were of feet," Miss Davies continued. "Nearly all were of female feet either in sandals or school-type pumps and taken from varied angles."
Diagnosis and sentence
Among all the images, only one amounted to voyeurism - an image Tobin had taken of a woman sunbathing in the privacy of her back garden - as a voyeurism charge requires the victim to be "doing a private act". The thousands of other images were all charged as a breach of his sexual risk order. For both prior breaches, said Miss Davies, Tobin had been given community orders. He was still subject to the most recent community order when his most recent offences were carried out.
Defence barrister Angelina Nurse said Tobin was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and awaiting possible diagnosis for attention deficit hyperactive disorder (ADHD). "That diagnosis, in my respectful submission, can be seen in his offending," she said. "There is, he will accept, an obsession, a compulsion, with taking photographs of feet, ankles and shoes." While there was "no doubt that the offending has crossed the custody threshold," the lawyer said, the probation service felt Tobin's risk could be managed in the community.
"Perhaps for someone that does not have the diagnosis [of autism], the community order with rehabilitation days may have done its job," said Miss Nurse. "That may have served as rehabilitation. But in Mr Tobin's circumstances, it may take just a little longer." Tobin had already started attending therapy in a bid to manage his urges, she added.
Recorder Clark sentenced Tobin to two years in prison but suspended it for two years, ordering him to carry out 120 hours of unpaid work, a "building better choices" course and up to 30 additional rehabilitation activity days with probation. "It does seem to me that despite the terrible history, there is a realistic prospect of rehabilitation," he said. But he did impose a 10-year sexual harm prevention order, which means Tobin will be on the sex offenders register for the same period. "You are really getting to the last chance saloon now," said the judge. "It's in your hands now to make sure you don't tip over the edge."
