Description
A nursery worker who raped a toddler and groomed 22 other girls over the internet has been jailed for life.
Paul Wilson, 21, admitted 47 charges including rape and grooming and must serve at least 15 years of a life term.
Wilson, of Nechells, Birmingham, abused the toddler at Little Stars Nursery in the city, and filmed the rape on his mobile phone.
Prosecutors said concerns raised by other nursery staff did not stop the abuse.
Wilson began working at the nursery in October 2009.
Six members of staff raised concerns about his behaviour before his arrest, on 5 January this year, but he had continued to work there despite receiving a written warning.
The judge said it was "a matter of some incredulity" that he had not been disciplined further for "deliberate blatant" flouting of nursery rules.
The Birmingham Safeguarding Trust board has started a serious case review into the matter and will not comment further at this stage.
Sentencing, the judge described his offences as "chilling, vile and depraved".
'Girls threatened'
Mrs Justice Macur said he had caused unknown harm to the toddler and more than 20 young girls who were abused online.
"You are highly deviant, highly manipulative. You are intelligent and the more dangerous for being so," she said.
The court heard Wilson, of Newbold Croft, was arrested after being reported by one of the girls he groomed.
He contacted 22 girls on the internet then made them perform sex acts via a webcam.
The victims were aged between 12 and 15, the court was told at an earlier hearing.
He would record images and use them to blackmail his victims into carrying out sexual acts for him.
After sentencing, Wendy Bounds of the Crown Prosecution Service, said Wilson had "preyed" on young girls he met in internet chat rooms.
"He hid his real identity and led the girls to think he was a friend and asked them to turn their webcams on and by this means he was able to see them in intimate situations," she said.
Pictures sent on
If his approach failed, he would use other aliases on social networking sites to gain their trust, or threaten them in order to get them to perform sexual acts which he would watch, she said.
"Unfortunately, the teenage girls did not realise that they were in effect allowing a stranger into their bedroom with a camera."
Pictures of one of the girls were then sent on to another male, she said.
"He then took this one step further by targeting and raping a vulnerable child at a nursery where he was working.
"Unfortunately, concerns raised by other staff about his behaviours and the appropriateness of his relationship with the child did not prevent this happening."
It was left to one girl to come forward and report the abuse to police, she said.
Ofsted issued a statement earlier in the case proceedings saying it had referred allegations to the local authority, Birmingham City Council.
An Ofsted spokesman said: "When Ofsted received allegations from a member of staff about possible safeguarding concerns at Little Stars Nursery, we immediately referred the allegations to the local authority, the lead agency locally with responsibility for safeguarding, and with them conducted a joint visit to the nursery.
"Following the visit, we required the nursery to ensure, amongst other things, that safeguarding policies were in place and procedures were properly followed.
"We are sorry that investigation did not bring to light what was happening sooner and for any additional distress this may have caused those affected by Mr Wilson's actions."
Wilson pleaded guilty in June to two charges of rape, 16 of causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity, 25 of making indecent images and three of distributing images of children.