A Paedophile police officer, DC Lee Cunliffe, who attempted to facilitate the exploitation of an eight-year-old girl and obtained obscene photographs of a vulnerable adolescent has been incarcerated.
Detective Constable Lee Cunliffe confessed to seven charges, including orchestrating the perpetration of a child sex crime.
The 40-year-old, Lee Cunliffe, constable of Greater Manchester Police (GMP) has been suspended from duty since his arrest in 2020.
Lee Cunliffe, from Wigan, was sentenced to eight years and four months in prison at Liverpool Crown Court.
The court was informed that Lee Cunliffe had served as an officer for 17 years when, in September 2020, he initiated communication with a lady he presumed to be the mother of an eight-year-old girl via the instant messaging application Kik.
Prosecutor Arthur Gibson stated that Lee Cunliffe informed the mother, who was in fact an undercover Metropolitan Police officer, of his intention to travel to London to sexually exploit her daughter.
Police investigations found that Lee Cunliffe transmitted the communications from multiple devices, including a police-owned computer at Swinton police station, leading to his arrest in October 2020.
Perverted desires
A subsequent search of the married father’s home revealed a laptop he had used to access indecent images of children, including of a “plainly vulnerable” teenage girl who made a complaint to GMP in 2018.
Mr Gibson said the girl had alleged her boyfriend had taken indecent images of her and distributed them without her knowledge.
Lee Cunliffe, then a trainee detective, was allocated to the case and the suspect’s computer and phone were seized after his arrest.
Mr Gibson said he later wrote an entry on the crime log stating there was nothing on either device relating to the offence, when “in fact, both devices contained both still and moving indecent images of children, a total of 227 being accessible”.
The computer was returned to the suspect with the indecent images still on and no further action was taken.
Evidence of files from between 2014 and 2018 which were indicative of child abuse were also found on Lee Cunliffe’s laptop.
Julian King, defending, said Lee Cunliffe had been going to see a psychotherapist, who said he had compulsive sexual behaviour disorder.
Lee Cunliffe, of Hindley Green, pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to arranging the commission of a child sex offence, perverting the course of justice, misconduct in a public office, distributing indecent photos of a child, and three counts of making indecent photos.
Sentencing him, Recorder of Liverpool, Judge Andrew Menary QC, said the actions Lee Cunliffe was “contemplating with this very young child could hardly have been more serious”.
“What you did in relation to this girl and this case is shocking and strikes at the very heart of that foundation of trust that the public have invested in the police service,” he added.
Speaking after sentencing, Deputy Chief Constable Terry Woods of GMP, said Lee Cunliffe’s “deplorable behaviour” was “absolutely inexcusable” and had “undermined the very essence of policing’s core value of protecting the public and helping those in need”.
Det Insp Suzanne Keenaghan, from GMP’s online child abuse investigation team, described his offending as “depraved”.
“Lee Cunliffe deliberately created an online profile with the perverted intention of arranging to commit a child sex offence and having indecent images in his possession for his own sexual gratification,” she said.
He will now face disciplinary action under the Police Conduct Regulations, GMP added.
Child protection charity, the NSPCC, said: “Lee Cunliffe’s actions were an appalling abuse of his position of trust.
“Through his police training and employment, Lee Cunliffe would have been very aware of the devastation sexual abuse has on children’s lives.
“Despite this, he chose to pursue his own perverted desires.”
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