AN ACCRINGTON sex offender is desperate to be let out of a Thai hellhole jail where he has languished for the last two months.
Alan Smith, 53, said he is becoming more depressed as the days go by.
After a national newspaper revealed he was working at a school in Thailand, Smith was arrested in December and thrown into a detention centre near the capital Bangkok.
He could eventually be deported, although he doesn’t have the £400 needed to buy an airline ticket back to England.
Speaking to the Observer from jail, Smith said: "Nobody has come forward offering to help. My mum is in a nursing home and my father is dead. I have no family or friends.
"Until I have the money to leave I am stuck here. Even if I get out I will be in a catch-22 situation because I can’t stay in Thailand."
Smith, formerly Accrington Stanley mascot Stan the Monkey, said his Thai wife, Pach, 26, visits him whenever she can but as she has no job and little money, there is little she can do for him.
He said: "My wife is very upset about the situation. She has been supportive but I can’t expect her to live on her own and wait for me. I may be in here for another 10 days, 10 months or even 10 years."
While he gets on with some of the men he shares his cell with, he said conditions are less than favourable.
He said: "The food is terrible and I have lost a lot of weight. People sleep on the floor with two blankets. I am lucky enough to have four and a pillow. I am managing but I want to get out. I miss my wife and the life we had."
He wants to continue to live in South East Asia as he feels he has no home in England.
He said: "I want to go back to the life I had here before that paper was published. What have I got back in Accrington? My house could be burgled and people will come after me. If I can’t live in Thailand I may move to Cambodia or Vietnam."
Smith, formerly of Carter Street, Accrington, appeared in court in August 2005 when he admitted sexual activity with a girl under 16.
The court was told that he prodded a 14-year-old girl’s bottom with a pool cue and later pulled up the top of her knickers in a "wedgie".
He was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment, but as he had already been in custody for five-and-a-half months while awaiting trial, he was released immediately.
Smith added: "I’ve done my time. I’m not a paedophile. I am registered as a sex offender and the authorities know where I am. I feel very bitter and angry all this has happened and want it to be over."
