A 39-YEAR-OLD man followed a teenage girl through a park and kissed her on the hand without her consent.

Swansea Crown Court heard that a 17-year-old girl had walked her boyfriend to Fishguard and Goodwick railway station on June 15, before heading back home.

The complainant walked through Lota Park and the defendant, Akif Sahan, was walking in the same direction.

As she continued to walk, looking at her phone, the defendant began saying: “Hello. Hello”.

“She carried on walking and didn’t look back,” said the prosecution.

She heard him say ‘Excuse me’ so turned around and saw he was about one metre away from her.

“He asked her how old she was and she replied she was 17. He then said words to the effect of  ‘Oh so you’re a child then’,” the prosecution said.

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The complainant tried to give the impression that she was on the phone, but the defendant continued to speak to her – asking if she wanted to talk more, and if she wanted to sit on a bench with him. She declined.

Sahan then extended his right hand, as if to offer to shake her hand, and said: ‘Hello, my name is Akif’.

She extended her hand, “thinking he might then leave her alone,” the prosecution said.

However, he grabbed her hand and kissed it. She pulled her hand away and told him she needed to leave. As she left, he called out ‘I work on the ship’.

She went home and told her mother about the incident.

Scott Bowen, in mitigation, said Sahan has no previous convictions, and “wished to apologise for any distress that he has caused” to the complainant.

The defendant is a Turkish national, and was in Fishguard as he was working on a cruise ship.

Sahan – of no fixed abode – was initially charged with sexual assault, which he denied. The prosecution elected to offer no evidence on this, instead pursing an offence of using threatening or abusive words or behaviour which was likely to cause alarm or distress.

The defendant pleaded guilty to this.

Addressing Sahan, Judge Paul Thomas said: “What you did was inappropriate and creepy.

“It was distressing for that 17-year-old girl.”

Judge Thomas, acting as a district judge, imposed a two-year conditional discharge, and granted the complainant a three-year restraining order. Sahan must also pay a £26 surcharge.