Paula Stanton 62

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A 62-year-old biological male identifying as a transgender woman, Paula Stanton of Severn Avenue, Barry, has been jailed after masturbating in front of staff at University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff.

Stanton, a Falklands War veteran and former soldier, was taken to the hospital by ambulance for a mental health assessment over concerns about self-harm.

Prosecutor Lewis Ball told Cardiff Crown Court:

“The defendant put her hands down her leggings to the groin area. Staff could see that she had her penis in her hand and that her hand was moving up and down. This was happening on and off. He made eye contact with one nurse while he was doing it. Hospital security was called but when they arrived, it had stopped.”

When police arrested Stanton, he told officers:

“I’ve done nothing wrong.”

Stanton pleaded guilty to carrying out an act outraging public decency. The incident occurred in the early hours of Sunday, May 17.

Stanton has 12 previous convictions for 19 offences. In August 2024 he was jailed for 12 months for two counts of outraging public decency after touching himself sexually in a flat window while wearing a black bra and white knickers under a dressing gown as women walked past. Stanton said it turned him on and left a “sinister” handwritten note under one victim’s car windscreen asking her to keep looking at him.

The latest offence breached a six-month suspended prison sentence imposed in August last year for exposure.

Stanton’s barrister, Alice Sykes, told the court that Stanton had already served the equivalent of a two-month jail term while remanded in custody since May.

Recorder Barry Clarke ruled the offending so serious that only an immediate custodial sentence could be justified.

Stanton was sentenced to 100 days for outraging public decency and a consecutive 60 days for breaching the suspended sentence, a total of 160 days. He will serve around 40 per cent of the sentence in custody before release on licence.