Gareth Hughes, the Stockport Paedophile, a managing director of a company, perpetrated four years of sexual assault on a schoolgirl after encountering her at the age of 14 via a social media platform that encourages its adolescent members to ‘snog, marry or avoid’.
Web designer Gareth Hughes, aged 36 at the time, misrepresented his age to the girl after they initiated communication on the rating site Snog.fm.
From 2012 to 2016, Gareth Hughes, a resident of Reddish, Stockport, often collected the girl from school in his Mazda 6, lavished her with gifts and thereafter took her to his flat for sexual encounters, which he recorded.
Gareth Hughes possessed numerous photographs of her archived on his computer in a folder titled ‘filth’.
At that time, he was anticipating a child with his long-term girlfriend. He is currently incarcerated.
The father of two was apprehended after the victim, now 21 and enrolled in university, asked Gareth Hughes to supper at her family residence, where she presented him with a compromising letter admitting to a sexual relationship that commenced prior to her undertaking her GCSE studies.
Investigations disclosed that Gareth Hughes, a university-educated computer science graduate, had also targeted two additional victims: one being the friend of the schoolgirl he sought to coerce into a threesome, and the other via the Snog.FM platform.
The principal victim earlier submitted an English tale during her GCSEs, alleging rape, but no action was taken at her request.
Officers subsequently discovered a Skype conversation in which the girl expressed her desire to become pregnant by Gareth Hughes, while he remarked that he wished she had done so when she was 14.
In a statement to police, she said, “I was sexually and emotionally abused by Gareth Hughes. He was 22 years older and more experienced than I – I was so young and vulnerable, I wasn’t even sure how to stand up for myself.
“When the abuse started, I was beginning my GCSEs. I was often late to school because I could not get out of bed. I think this was a symptom of depression. I would go days without showering. I would binge eat to deal with the trauma of abuse.
“I still have a lot of trouble getting out of bed. At my worst, I put myself in dangerous situations. It has had a huge impact on my academic performance – it is very unlikely I will finish my degree.
“I have tried CBT and talking therapy, but nothing has had any real impact. I have suicidal feelings that are impossible to control. Sometimes I feel like I cease to exist; the only thing that has stopped me from committing suicide is that when I was 18, my best friend killed herself.
“I have nightmares about the abuse, and sometimes I have flashbacks during consensual sexual encounters. It has caused me emotional damage that will last as long as I live. He made the repeated decision that his sexual gratification was more important than the mental health of myself and the other victims.”
At Minshull Street Crown Court, Manchester, Hughes, now 43, was jailed for six years and eight months after he pleaded guilty to five counts of sexual activity with a child, two counts of inciting a child to engage in sexual activity, eight counts of making an indecent image of a child, two counts of distributing an indecent photo of a child and one count of possessing an extreme pornographic image.
The court heard that the abuse began in 2012 when she was just 14.
Prosecutor Miss Simone Flynn said: “Shortly before the Easter holidays in 2013, when she was 15, she handed to her English teacher a story. In that story, she describes a girl meeting a man in town, and flashbacks that happen reveal that she had been abused.
“When the teacher asked the girl what the inspiration was, she said: ”Isn’t it obvious I have been raped?” The teacher informed the head teacher, who contacted her mother, and it transpired that a year earlier she had gone to meet someone in the Arndale Centre.
”But the girl refused to say anything to her mother and was upset with the school, and around this time her mother started to find things in her room that she wouldn’t have been able to afford. She found credit card receipts in the name of Gareth Hughes. Her daughter told her she had met someone on the internet, and he liked to buy her things.
“In September 2015, she left home to go to university, and her mental health deteriorated; she was diagnosed with anxiety and depression. In 2016, her friend committed suicide, and she moved home and only returned to university to take her exams.
“She began to talk to her parents about the defendant, saying she would like them to meet him as he had been a real support to her. The defendant did come to her home to dinner and appeared to be supportive of their daughter, but they had concerns as to the age difference.
“She then gave her parents a letter, and in that letter, she said she had met him when she was 14 and they had been in a sexual relationship. She said he had threatened to commit suicide if she didn’t do what he wanted. He would often make her leave the house in the night and insist that she have sex with him.
“She said that she had not been raped, and she said she wasn’t sure how to tell anyone at the time.”
The court heard the girl then went to the police in October 2016, telling how in late 2011, when she was 14, she would go on a website called ”Snog.fm” in which users looked at other profile pictures and rated them to ”snog, marry or avoid.”
Miss Flynn added, “The defendant also used the website, and he started a conversation with her and told her that she had a young body. He told her he was 26, when he was 36, which was outside the age range of the usual users of that site. They were usually between 15 and 18.
“She told him she was 16, she considered him to be funny, and she felt flattered because the defendant liked her. After a while, she met him at their local Tesco, he took her back to his flat, and he touched her on the neck and breast.
“He would ask her to strip on video, and he would do the same. They spoke on Skype, and a few weeks later, they met, and he took her back to his flat to have sex.
”He asked her if she was really 16. She then told him that she was 14. He then revealed he was 36, and they agreed to continue to meet up. She found out he had a girlfriend who was pregnant with their first child. He wanted to make things work with his girlfriend, but said he and the victim should still continue to meet.
“They would meet three times a week. He would pick her up straight from school, and they would have sex. He would record what they were doing and take photographs of her lying naked on the bed. She continued to strip and perform sexual acts on Skype. She asked him to use a condom, but he refused to do so, saying it hurt.
“In 2016, the defendant began renting an office in Rusholme. He took her to the office and showed her a folder on his computer that contained a large number of pictures of her aged 14 and 15 performing sexual acts.
“The victim began to see someone else; however, the defendant found out and persuaded her to start seeing him again. Eventually, she decided she had had enough and went to university, and he said he would move and join her. She then decided to tell her parents of what had occurred.
“The second complainant met the defendant on a weekend when she was at the first victim’s house having a sleepover. The other girl received a text saying he wanted her to come round, and she suggested to her friend that she come with her.
“The defendant came around and collected them both, drove them back to his flat. Once at the flat, the girls went into the bedroom, the defendant joined them, and he was naked.”
The third victim was contacted via Snog.fm by Gareth Hughes, who encouraged her to send naked photographs of herself.
Police attended Gareth Hughes’ workplace in 2016 and seized two computers and an iPhone, which contained indecent images of children and extreme pornography, totalling 260 still and moving images, including one of a five-year-old.
There were records of emails and Skype conversations between the first victim and the defendant.
Gareth Hughes was released pending investigation, but then went on the run and used aliases, swapped phone numbers and conducted all his financial transactions using prepaid credit cards in a bid to give police the slip.
Gareth Hughes was traced and arrested at his current workplace in London in January 2019.
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