A pervert who thought he was preying on a 14-year-old girl online had fallen into a trap set by vigilantes.
Craig Davison believed he had been chatting with a schoolgirl from Gateshead called Paige on Facebook but it was a decoy profile set up by paedophile hunters. Newcastle Crown Court heard he asked for pictures of her and send videos of himself carrying out a sex act.
Now the 35-year-old, who has no previous convictions, has been given a suspended prison sentence after he admitted attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child in December 2021.
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Sentencing him, Recorder Tom Moran said: "You contacted a Facebook profile of someone you thought was a 14-year-old girl. It was not a real account, it was set up to trap people believed to have a sexual interest in children.
"You asked for intimate pictures and invited her to watch you (carrying out a sex act) and sent videos and pictures of you doing so and asked for images in return. You were arrested shortly after this."
Davison, of Eddleston, Rickleton, Washington, was sentenced to eight months suspended for two years with a community order. He must also sign the sex offenders register for 10 years and will be subject to a sexual harm prevention order for five years.
The court heard his mum had died weeks before the offences, which "hit him very hard" and he turned to alcohol and he can't recall the offending.
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