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Family doctor caught trying to groom ’13-year-old girl’ over the internet keeps his job – Mirror Online


A family doctor caught trying to groom a 13-year-old girl over the internet has kept his job.

Dr Hafeez Awan swapped hug emojis, online kisses and a string of inappropriate messages with the youngster – not realising she was really an undercover detective investigating online paedophile gangs.

During several hours of conversations over a 16-day period in an internet chatroom and on Watts App, Awan, a GP in Sheepscar, Leeds, West Yorks gave himself the user name Medic333 and said: “R u single?” and “R u at school?” when told the girl was 13.

Th 44-year-old’s turned down a illicit rendezvous following the messages but was reported to the General Medical Council over the illicit communications.

At the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service, the GP faced being struck off after being found guilty of sexually motivated misconduct – but escaped with a nine months suspension after a panel said he had not engaged in any “sexually explicit conversations”.

He will face a review hearing next August.

He contacted the girl over the internt

 

 

The GP had denied wronging claiming he never thought the girl was 13 and only carried out chatting to establish her “true age”.

Panel chairman Mrs Sharmistha Michaels said: “Dr Awan has made some efforts to reflect on his behaviour and has started to put measures in place to ensure that this conduct is not repeated. He said no longer uses chat rooms and has found other methods to ‘de-stress’.

“It is clear that he is a well-regarded doctor and that there are no clinical concerns and there is no evidence that Dr Awan has repeated his misconduct.

“For all these reasons, it therefore determined that the risk of repetition in this case is low. The Tribunal accepted that Dr Awan does not pose a risk to patients and his clinical competence has not been called into question.”

She added: “The Tribunal is of the opinion that Dr Awan’s misconduct was serious, but falls short of being fundamentally incompatible with continued registration.

He kept his job as a doctor

“Erasing Dr Awan’s name from the medical register would be disproportionate, given the circumstances of this case and that a period of suspension would suffice in order to send a signal to the doctor, the profession and the public about what is regarded as behaviour unbefitting of a registered doctor.

“It also considered the public interest would be best served by not depriving the public of an otherwise competent doctor.”

The investigation began in January 2016 after Awan who moved to the UK in 2003 from his native Pakistan made contact with the South Yorkshire Police investigator who gave the name SofiaSheff.

Lawyer for the General Medical Council Michael Blakey told the Manchester hearing: “There is no dispute that ‘Medic 333’ and the telephone number provided to person A are those of Dr Awan. He says: ‘Are you single?’ and Sofia Sheff says: ‘Yes but I’m 13 please don’t say anything’.

“But despite that information Dr Awan continued chatting asking if she went to school and identifying himself as a doctor – we say that is of some significance because of the level of trust. e asked what she was doing, she says she is in bed, he says so is he.

“He asked for Person A’s telephone number saying he wants to listen to her voice and it continues in that vein. Two weeks later Person A contacted Doctor Awan and he started asking questions confirming where she resided, confirming how old she is. She said she was she 15 soon to be 16? He said he wanted to meet person A but couldn’t do so until she was 16 as it will be illegal.”

Awan who moved to Canada in 2017 said he used chatroom to block out his memories of a robbery in his native Pakistan in December 2013 in which he claimed he was beaten up by up to 12 masked men whilst visiting his family.

He said his brother’s wife had orchestrated the attack after learning the GP had been sending large sums of money to his family from the UK.

Awan said: “I was recovering when that chat happened as when I would be sleeping I was seeing these people in front of me. It was just general chit chat it was nothing to do with finding partners or anything sexual. I didn’t believe she was 13.

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“I had no intentions of meeting her. At the time of our online communication I did not pay any attention to Person A’s age. It was of no consequence to me because the conversation was just words on a screen. It had no meaning to me.”

His lawyer Mr Ben Rich told the hearing: “Dr Awan’s conduct was at the lower end of the spectrum.

“He has undertaken courses to educate himself on the impact of social media as well as his reporting obligations in respect of vulnerable children.

“He has continued practising since 2016 without any further issues.”





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