A young woman was sexually assaulted by a homeless stranger she had tried to help after he approached her in the street and said he wanted to kill himself.

The woman had no idea Grant Percival, 40, was a persistent offender with a criminal record that includes a battery and several sex crimes, including grooming and an indecent assault on a child.

Percival, who has recently been living in Bury, admitted sexually touching the 20-year-old woman in Kendal on June 19.

Outlining the facts at Carlisle Crown Court, prosecutor Brendan Burke said that the victim had been walking along Burneside Road in Kendal at 11.30pm when she saw a man – the defendant – stumbling towards her, obviously drunk.

“He approached her and asked her what the best place was to kill himself,” said Mr Burke. The woman’s attitude throughout the encounter was concern for the defendant’s welfare. Percival began telling the woman a series of lies.

He claimed that his 18-month-old daughter had died and asked the woman if she had ever lost anybody or “had her heart broken.”

Mr Burke said: “She decided to stay with him because of concern about whether he would kill himself.

“She tried to persuade him to go to the police station… He said he didn’t want to go to the police station because he had family nearby.”

Former Carslisle man Percival kept stepping into the road in front of cars and the woman tried to stop him. Mr Burke continued: “He started hugging her and she did not take that sexually; she let him do it because he was in distress.

“He did then kiss her on the top of the head, which definitely was not wanted by the woman; he told her that she was beautiful and asked if she could go home with him but just for a cuddle, nothing sexual.”

By this stage, the court heard, the woman was nervous for herself. Percival kept asking the woman for her phone number and as she was about to walk away he tried to kiss her hand, though it was covered by her coat.

Mr Burke outlined the defendant’s criminal history, consisting of 24 previous offences.

They include a public order crime, malicious communication, a battery and, more relevantly, an indecent assault in 2003, an indecent assault the following year on a child, sexual assaults in 2011 and 2012, a grooming offence from 2018.

There were also various breaches of the defendant’s sexual harm prevention order.

Gerard Rogerson, defending, said Percival had started the night in a happy mood but this changed after he took alcohol and was made worse because he was living in a tent.

“He denies that he felt genuinely suicidal,” said the barrister.

The sexual assault consisted of the defendant kissing the woman on the head and trying to kiss her hand and this appeared not to have distressed the victim, despite the incident being both disturbing and unpleasant.

The offence was very much at the low end on the scale of seriousness, said Mr Rogerson.

Percival pointed out that he had been given no help since he was released from his last sentence. Asked what he wanted to change about himself, he had told a probation officer that his problem was alcohol.

“He describes himself as a registered alcoholic,” said Mr Rogerson.

The defendant felt that with the right support he could address his drink problem and lead a more productive life. The barrister added: “He is willing to do whatever it takes to turn his life around.”

Judge Michael Fanning said Percival had in the past been deemed to be a dangerous offender because of his assaults against young females. Despite appearing initially to want only comfort and help before the offence, it quickly became apparent that he wanted “rather more than that”, said the judge.

“A 20-year-old being approached by you, a 40-year-old man… it’s downright creepy and in your case rather more sinister because of your lengthy history of sexual offending,” continued the judge.

But Judge Fanning accepted that there had been a “downshift” in the level of the defendant’s offending. He jailed Percival for eight months.

The judge also imposed a updated sexual harm prevention order which forbids Percival from interacting with or “encroaching into the personal space” of any female who is a stranger to him and this applies in all circumstances other than those “objectively” assessed to be a genuine emergency.

Percival, more recently living at Walmersley Road, Bury, will be on the Sex Offender Register indefinitely.