A man has been jailed for sending sexual messages and grooming girls he believed were as young as 12 on Facebook.
John Mongan, 54, from Hackney created a fake social media account and made contact with six girls.
He was sentenced at Snaresbrook Crown Court to nine years in prison for six counts of attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child, two counts of attempting to incite a child to engage in sexual activity and attempting to meet a child following sexual grooming.
He will also be on the sex offenders register for life after pursing the girls he believed were aged 12-14.
The court had heard Mongan added each of the profiles as friends and messaged them privately, believing they were children.
Within the first few messages Mongan’s communications became increasingly sexual, despite the profiles making their young ages clear from the start and reminding him throughout.
Mongan’s messages were very demanding and graphic. He also sent numerous photographs of what he claimed was his penis, and made frequent attempts to engage in sexualised phone and video calls with the profiles.
He also sent photographs of large piles of cash, asking how they would like to spend it. He wrote things such as “all I want in return is plenty of sex and love from you could you give me all of that”, the jury was told
He travelled to Homerton train station in Hackney in August 2020 where he had used his fake Facebook profile to arrange to meet with who he believed was a 14-year-old girl.
It was his intention for this meeting to become sexual.
As he arrived Mongan realised the meeting was not with a 14-year-old girl and he left. Later that evening he was spotted in the local area and police arrested him.
Throughout the investigation it was clear that Mongan was aware his actions were illegal and wrong and he made several attempts to cover his tracks and evade being caught, the court heard.
He deleted evidence of his conversations and officers spent hours investigating his devices and building up evidence to attribute the fake Facebook profile to Mongan.
He was charged in January 2022 and was remanded in custody.
PC Lindsey England, who is a member of the Central East Online Child Sexual Abuse and Exploitation Team, led the investigation.
She said: “As part of the investigation I reviewed hundreds of pages of communication. Almost every single page contains extremely sexualised chat from Mongan, with him sometimes giving detailed instructions and descriptions of sexual acts.
“The profiles gave him no encouragement, and instead attempted to remind him of how disinterested and inexperienced they were in sex. Mongan’s methods of manipulation and grotesque use of language are some of the worst I have seen. Mongan used threats of foster homes and promises of love, care and money in an attempt to feed his own sexual fantasies and interests.
“His desire to groom and abuse who he believed to be six different children came above anything else, and he did so without any care of the impact this may have had. His only interests were making every attempt possible to deny and hide his criminal activities. He would have very likely continued this offending if he wasn’t arrested.”
Anyone who wishes to report a similar offence whether it happened recent or non-recent is encouraged to report to police via 101 or online via the website: https://www.met.police.uk/ro/report/ocr/af/how-to-report-a-crime/.