counselling for a man who sexually exploited a girl.

In the appeal of the case against Cecil Eardley Smith, Chief Justice Austin Ward rejected prosecutors' attempt to have the sentence overturned on the grounds that it was "manifestly inadequate''.

Fifty-four-year-old Smith was sentenced in June, by Senior Magistrate Will Francis, after a trial in which he was convicted of sexually exploiting a girl under 14 years of age in Hamilton Parish on May 17, 1997.

Earlier this year, Smith, of Till's Hill, Pembroke, had appealed his conviction after a September 1998 trial.

In May, Mr. Justice Ward dismissed that appeal, allowing Mr. Francis to proceed with sentencing.

But last month, Mr. Justice Ward found Mr. Francis had taken into account "all the relevant factors'' behind the case in coming up with the sentence.

Smith's lawyer, Philip Perinchief, had argued the magistrate should have taken into account the potential loss of a job for his client if he were to be convicted.

Mr. Justice Ward, after hearing Smith had lost his Government job and after he had reviewed case law, wrote that an inadequate sentence was "a failure to apply right principles'' in law.

"I cannot say that the sentence is wrong in principle or manifestly inadequate,'' the judge wrote. "In the scale of sexual assaults, this particular assault was at the lower end of the scale.'' During the trial, the court had heard Smith touched the girl's private parts as he drove her along Wilkinson Avenue.

A prosecutor told the Court that Smith told the girl: "It's all right to be scared.'' The girl later slapped away Smith's hand when he tried to touch her on Berkeley Road in Pembroke.

Smith claimed he only touched the girl to point out a friend's house -- then to comfort her because she could not find a swimsuit she wanted.

FINE FOR FOULD LANGUAGE CTS Fine for foul language Calling the manager of Lopes Liquor Mart a "white c***t'' and threatening to "get'' him will cost a 25-year-old man a $200 fine.

Jermaine Butterfield, of 7 Cambridge Road, Sandys Parish yesterday pleaded guilty before Magistrate Archibald Warner to verbally abusing Douglas Roberts at 8 p.m. on September 15 last year.

Crown counsel Leighton Rochester told the court that Mr. Roberts was emptying the trash that evening when he noticed a man sitting on a cycle wearing dark clothes and his face covered up to his eyes.

When Mr. Roberts looked closer, the man said: "Roberts! You white c***t. I'm going to get you.'' The store manager recognised the voice and also noted the registration number of the cycle, AN495, as the man rode away.

Mr. Rochester said Mr. Roberts was "extremely offended'' and called Police who traced the cycle to Butterfield.

When he was initially charged earlier this year, Butterfield said: "I didn't do nothing.'' Yesterday, he said nothing in his defence.