A 46-year-old teacher who posed as a teenager online to ask girls for indecent images of themselves has been jailed for eight years.
Simon Clark, from Ellesmore Port, Cheshire, was a teacher in Flintshire when he pretended to be a 14-year-old boy and sent messages to 26 girls aged between 10 and 15.
Clark previously admitted 29 offences including inciting children under 13 to engage in sexual activity, and 21 counts of sexual communication with a child and making indecent images of children – 26 of which were in the most serious category.
His offences came to light in January 2023, when a mother saw explicit messages from the father-of-two on her 12-year-old daughter’s laptop.
Chester Crown Court heard the messages included requests for pictures of the girl’s body, which the mother reported to North Wales Police.
The account was in the name of Jamie_jones6968 who claimed to be a schoolboy in England, but the IP address of the account which sent the messages was traced to Clark.
The court heard the case was then passed to detectives from the Online Child Abuse Investigation Team at Cheshire Police.
Devices were seized from Clark’s home where police found hundreds of messages to dozens of girls – many under the age of 16.
He had sent indecent videos to some girls and asked for them to send some back to him.
Cheshire Police praised the complainants for their bravery and described Clark as a sexual predator who despite being in a position of trust, continued his crimes to “satisfy his own warped sexual desires”.
Sentencing him to eight years, Judge Simon Berkson said his crimes were “a parent’s worst nightmare” and showed “clear grooming of young girls”.
He said it was “well planned, sophisticated, criminal behaviour”.
As a result he said Clark had “lost everything” including his job, marriage and unsupervised access to his own young children.
He will face an extended four years on licence at the end of his sentence.
An NSPCC spokesperson said: “As a teacher Clark had a duty to keep children safe.
“Instead for seven years he posed as a teenage boy on a social media platform, using his fake profile to target and groom young girls before persuading them to send naked images of themselves.
“This kind of sexual abuse can have a devasting impact on the victims and it is vital all the children involved in this case have access to the support they need to move forwards with their lives.
“This case also highlights the need for social media sites to be doing much more to protect children and prevent offenders like Clark from using their platforms to carry out their crimes.”
