Paedophile jailed after grooming teenage girl online

A Birmingham paedophile who groomed a teenage girl he met in an online chat room and then had sex with her, has been jailed for three years.

Mark Caudery, who persuaded the 14-year-old victim to send him indecent images of herself, was caught after she told a school mentor what had been going on.

34-year-old Caudery of Sheffield Road, Kings Heath, who had previously admitted inciting a child to engage a child in sexual activity, engaging in sexual activity with a child, engaging in sexual activity in the presence of a child and two charges of making indecent images, was also ordered to register as a sex offender for life.

The city’s crown court heard that Caudery was 32 when he first met the girl in a chat room for people with depression.

She was suffering from that illness following the death of her father.

About 15 or 16 months beforehand the victim’s mother had noticed there was something not right with her, and she had read messages on her daughter’s Facebook page which were clearly inappropriate.

She contacted Caudery and thought she had ended the friendship but it continued with him meeting the girl and having sex with her.

When the defendant was arrested police found 280 indecent child images on his computer, including pictures of the victim and a video.

The judge said another aggravating factor was the large disparity between their ages, and the defendant had carried on even after he had been warned off by the girl’s mother.