A CATERING student set up a fake Facebook profile in her brother-in-law’s name and sent sexually explicit messages to underage girls just to get her own back. 

Dorothy Norris was angry after hearing he had pleaded guilty to a charge of bigamy and decided to frame him as a pervert. 

The incident became known to police when the two teenage girls alerted their parents. 

Norris, 27, of Broomhead Drive, Dunfermline, previously admitted to an amended charge that on September 27 and 28, 2014, at her home address or elsewhere, she did act in a manner likely to cause a reasonable person fear or alarm and, using Facebook, pretended to be her brother-in-law and repeatedly sent in his name sexually explicit and offensive messages to two girls under the age of 14. 

In all, seven messages were sent to the girls from the fake Facebook profile. 

During investigations, police established quickly who had sent the messages and they seized Norris’ phone. 

The court heard that when arrested, the catering student said she had done it “to get back” at her brother-in-law after having an argument beforehand and accepted that it was a childish thing to do. 

Depute fiscal Jade Doig told Dunfermline Sheriff Court that events had caused considerable stress to both the brother-in-law and two teenage girls. 

Defence solicitor James Moncrieff said his client had a difficulty with her brother-in-law. 

“He had pleaded guilty to a charge of bigamy,” Mr Moncrieff explained. “He joked about it and Ms Norris did not take kindly to it.

"Police found out early on in the investigations that the sexually explicit message to the girls had not been sent by her brother-in-law and suspicion then went to her.

"She feels completely sick at what she did and is a first-time offender. Her current partner is in custody and she has quite a difficult background. 

“I have known her to be the complainer in other matters with violent partners. She made a poor error of judgement over a period of two days.”

Sheriff Derek Reekie told Norris: “You completely dragged innocent children into this. To say that this was a poor error of judgement is an understatement. 

“I cannot understand what was going through your mind. To get back at someone is one thing but to involve children of this age is another. 

“I have regard to give you a custodial sentence, however, I will place you on a community payback order instead to undertake 200 hours of unpaid work. 

“This is a direct alternative to custody and I hope this comes as a warning. This is a highly unpleasant case and the response of the two girls to tell the police was to their credit, not yours.”