A former United Bermuda Party candidate who contacted a teenaged girl more than 1,200 times in a 20-day period appeared in Magistrates' Court yesterday for breaching his probation.

Anthony Steede, 49, of Bat N Ball Lane, Sandys, pleaded guilty in Magistrates' Court to breaching the order by contacting the 17-year-old, who was aged 15 at the time of the offence.

Although Steede pleaded guilty to breaching his probation he said in a letter, which he read in court, that he had not contacted the girl, rather she contacted him.

The former Bermuda Regiment soldier admitted that he was guilty for allowing the contact to go on.

He said that when the girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, called him he picked her up in his car and took her to his home to listen to what she had to say. Steede told the court that within 30 minutes the Police were at his door.

He said that for a year he had been compliant with his probation and had not contacted the girl. He pleaded with the court to not send him to jail saying he had just started working with a multi-million dollar company and was rebuilding his family life.

Steede asked Magistrate Khamisi Tokunbo if there was any way he could be protected from the teenager as he felt that the whole situation was a set up.

But Mr. Tokunbo told him that the order was set up to protect the teenager from him, not the other way around.

Mr. Tokunbo said: "You were doing good all this time and then you took her to your house – you screwed yourself. What you need to do, if she contacts you, is run the other way and call the authorities."

He ordered Steede to continue his probation through to 2009 and fined him $1,000 for being in breach or the order.