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A grandmother who was spared jail despite admitting sexually abusing a schoolboy could go to prison if her sentence is ruled “unduly lenient”.

Marie McCarthy, 62, of Hurst Park Drive, was convicted of four counts of indecent assault against the teenager in 1986, when she was 33.

In October she was sentenced to 21 months of imprisonment, suspended for two years.

But her case has now been referred to the Court of Appeal by the Solicitor General under the Unduly Lenient Sentence scheme, the Liverpool Echo reported.

Solicitor General Robert Buckland QC, the MP for South Swindon, will present the case at the Court of Appeal tomorrow and the sentence could be increased.

Read more:Gran who stole virginity of schoolboy comes face-to-face with victim in court 30 years later

McCarthy was also placed under supervision for two years with attendance on a probation project and ordered to sign the Sex Offender Register for 10 years when she was sentenced at Liverpool Crown Court.

Judge Denis Watson, QC, said, “Over the course of a six-week summer holiday you seduced him, the son of a friend of yours. As you look back now at your behaviour then as a mature 33-year-old towards a 15-year-old boy I hope you realise how shameful and grotesque it was.

“You manipulated him for your own sexual advantage, you groomed him. You knew the riot of emotions he as a 15-year-old was going through as adolescence and puberty sent him one way and then the other. You used him as your sexual plaything.”

The victim did not tell the police about the incidents until 2014.

Judge Watson told the Grandma: “You deserve to go to prison for what you did, it was not a one off but a string of different sexual acts against him that summer. The very fact that he came forward last year to tell someone tells you it is not something he has been able to leave behind at all.”

But, he said he took into account her various health problems, good character and guilty pleas, although she only admitted the offences on the day set for her trial.

Teresa Loftus, defending, said that McCarthy had been forced to tell her children and grandchildren what she had done almost three decades ago and she was “genuinely ashamed”.