Karl Grocott, aged 44, of Sale, Greater Manchester, has been released from prison on licence after serving the custodial portion of a 33-month sentence for grooming and attempting to meet a child with the intention of committing rape.
Grocott, who was employed as a data analyst, was apprehended following a covert sting operation conducted by Merseyside Police. The court heard that Grocott created a false online persona, posing as a 27-year-old schoolteacher to initiate communications with an individual he believed to be a 12-year-old boy. During the online grooming, Grocott arranged to meet the child at a McDonald’s restaurant situated on Edge Lane in Liverpool, intending to escort him to a local hotel room.
The profile was operated by an undercover detective investigating online child exploitation. Specialist officers moved in and arrested Grocott in the vicinity of the restaurant shortly before the arranged meeting was scheduled to take place.
Grocott had a documented record of sexual offending, having previously been convicted of making indecent images of children and made subject to a Sexual Harm Prevention Order (SHPO). Despite these prohibitions, he engaged in grooming communications and planned the physical meeting.
Sentencing him at Liverpool Crown Court in August 2025, Judge Neil Flewitt KC remarked that Grocott’s objective was penetrative sexual activity with a child under the age of 13, conduct that would have constituted child rape had police not intervened.
Grocott entered guilty pleas to attempting to meet a child following grooming and attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child, receiving a 27-month sentence. An additional six-month term was imposed consecutively for breaching his Sexual Harm Prevention Order, resulting in an aggregate sentence of 33 months.
Under standard determinate sentencing legislation, offenders serve half of their sentence in closed conditions before being released into the community on licence under the supervision of the Probation Service and subjected to statutory notification requirements on the Sex Offenders Register. Grocott has now completed that custodial period and been discharged on licence.
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