Judge tells Stortford dentist Alan Urie who asked ‘schoolboy’ for nude pictures to ‘stay out of trouble’


A Bishop’s Stortford dentist in his 60s who thought he was going to meet a teenage boy for sex was given a two-year suspended prison sentence on Monday (Feb 25).

Married Alan Urie thought he was chatting to a 15-year-old boy called Ben on gay dating site Grindr when he was actually speaking to a paedophile hunter, St Albans Crown Court heard.

Prosecutor James Keeley said that the dentist used the screen name ‘Older/younger’ when he contacted the ‘boy’ in the early hours of May 11, 2017.

Urie, who was then 63, told him he looked “very attractive” when he was sent a picture of a youth in school uniform. The ‘boy’ told him: “I don’t think I said I am 15, by the way.”

They swapped details of what they liked sexually. Urie asked him when he would be 16 and quizzed him on the type of underwear he liked.
The balding defendant asked for nude photos of Ben and said: “Are you looking to be f*****?”

Two planned meetings between Urie and the boy were cancelled by the dentist. On June 12, 2017, he arranged to meet, first at Bishop’s Stortford’s household waste recycling centre but changed that venue to the Birchanger Green M11 services on the edge of town. He was arrested in his car when the vigilante contacted police.

When questioned, Urie accepted he was planning to meet Ben, but claimed it was not for sexual purposes. However, in court, Urie, now 65, pleaded guilty to attempting to incite a child to engage in sexual activity.

Defending, Matthew Gowen said: “He is 65-and-a-half and was arrested 20 months ago. He has never been before the court before.
“He had a profession, a career and was well respected by peers and those he came into contact with. There are character references from those with whom he has had professional contact and his family.

Mr Gowen claimed there was no real victim in the case.

Judge Nigel Lithman QC told Urie: “This is charged as an attempt. No child existed and none was abused.

“The whole nature of the offence cultivates the culture of abuse of children, which is as reprehensible an offence as one can find.

“What singles this case out was that there was a degree of wrestling by you with your conscience which told you you were running headlong into disaster.
Fortunately, no actual child suffered.”

The judge said that Urie’s mitigation was “exceptional” and that this enabled him to go outside the sentencing guidelines and impose a suspended prison sentence.

The judge passed a two-year sentence, suspended for two years. Urie, of Barrells Down Road, must carry out 200 hours’ unpaid work and attend 20 days of a rehabilitation activity requirement. He must register as a sex offender and abide by the terms of a sexual harm prevention order for 10 years. His phone was forfeited.

He said: “I am making a high unpaid work order – 200 hours – a lengthy time for you to reflect on what you have done and whether you are going to make bad choices in the future. You can go, but you better stay out of trouble. You better had.”

* Urie was a dentist at the former Oasis Dental Care surgery in Barrett Lane in Bishop’s Stortford town centre. On February 19, the General Dental Council continued an interim suspension order imposed on July 5, 2017, on his registration to practise, for “the purposes of public protection and otherwise in the public interest”.