Footballer fights for career after wrongful conviction

Shaun Tuton has played for clubs including Halifax, Barnsley and Grimsby

A former professional footballer wrongly convicted of performing a sex act in public is fighting to rebuild his career after what he described as "the toughest time of his life".

Ex-Barnsley striker Shaun Tuton was dropped by Whitby Town after he was found guilty of outraging public decency, with details of the case reported in the national press.

His conviction was later overturned on appeal, but the 32-year-old said the damage had been done, having lost his club and profession almost overnight.

Speaking to the BBC, he said: "It's taken up so many years of my life already, now I want to use these last years I've got to try and play at the highest level I can and try and enjoy something I love."

Mr Tuton signed for Barnsley in 2016, helping the club gain promotion to the Championship.

Mr Tuton said he had risen through the ranks “the hard way”, progressing from academy football to spells with non league sides Matlock, Buxton and Halifax.

In 2016 he joined Barnsley and was part of the squad which won promotion to the Championship that year.

He went on to play for a number of other clubs, eventually joining Whitby in 2023.

However, within months of signing for the club he was arrested by police investigating an incident at Sheffield railway station dating back to 2021.

"I was gobsmacked," he said.

"When they first started to arrest me they said it was an incident at a train station, but in my head I knew whatever situation it was it was impossible because I'd not been on a train in years.

"When they actually said what it was I was in disbelief. No one wants to be put in that category."

He said he was shown CCTV footage of the man believed to be him and was "in shock", saying the suspect looked "completely different" to him.

'Heartbreaking'

His mother Ann said she shared her son's surprise.

“We just brushed it off straight away," she said. "You could see it wasn’t Shaun. He looked completely different.”

However, after he was later picked out of a police line up the odds were stacked against him, and, on 28 March 2023, he was found guilty at Barnsley Magistrates' Court of outraging public decency.

He was give an 12-month community order and told to pay £250 in compensation.

The story was picked up by a number of newspapers, with one national publication running the story beneath the headline "Perv Nailed".

Following his conviction his contract with Whitby was terminated.

"It was heartbreaking," he said. "I was branded as this horrible human.

"I lost my club and I lost my income because of this.

"I told them I would be appealing. They could have waited."

The BBC has approached Whitby Town for a comment but received no response.

'Taken away'

Mr Tuton said the months after his conviction were the "toughest period" of his life.

"It was horrible," he said. "I used to sit in my bedroom and just cry.

"I’ve played football since I was six. It was never a job for me. It was my place of freedom and it was just taken away."

His mum said she also remembered the "dark days" after his conviction.

"I used to watch him 24 hours a day. I used to sit outside his bedroom door listening to him breathing. He didn't want his life at that moment," she said.

Mr Tuton in action for Buxton in 2014

Mr Tuton did appeal and his conviction was quashed during a hearing at Sheffield Crown Court on 20 September 2023.

He said he had been "better prepared" for the appeal, producing mobile phone and training records. While his manager at the time of the incident and a former teammate also gave evidence.

"When they said I was not guilty I froze. It took for me to look at my friends and my family, and they were hugging... that's when it hit, I'd finally after all this time got this massive weight off my shoulders."

Asked about Mr Tuton's case, a Crown Prosecution Service spokesperson said: “After carefully reviewing all the evidence available at the time, we proceeded with the prosecution based on our view that there was sufficient evidence to put before the court, and we respect the decision of the court to overturn Shaun Tuton’s conviction on appeal."

Despite having his conviction overturned, Mr Tuton has not been able to return to playing professional football, and is currently playing with his friends at his boyhood club Handsworth FC.

He now wants to "set the record straight".

"People were quick to put it out there, that a footballer were getting done in a court for this," he said.

"Now I've proved that it wasn't me, there's nothing that's been put out there to say I was done wrong."

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