A former Luton teacher is facing time in jail after admitting to sending sexually explicit messages, images and videos to young girls.
Khaled Miah, 40, of Belswains Lane, Hemel Hempstead, pleaded guilty to the offences at Luton Crown Court on Friday, June 5, and will be sentenced on June 26.
In November 2019, when Miah was living and working in Luton, he used an online chat site to communicate with who he believed to be a 13-year-old girl, before taking her number so he could send her messages via WhatApp.
Over the course of approximately six days, he sent a number of highly sexualised messages, images and a video of himself.
He was arrested after his actions were discovered during a proactive police operation. He was released under investigation in February 2020.
In June 2020, the Internet Child Abuse Investigation Team (ICAIT) was informed that Miah has been communicating with who he believed to be 12-year-old girl using the same methods. He was arrested and his phone was seized.
Officers later found that cloud storage linked to his phone contained indecent images of children. Miah was charged with attempting to cause a child to watch an image of sexual activity, two counts of attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child and possessing two category C indecent images of a child, which he has pleaded guilty to.
Investigating Officer Paul Baddeley from ICAIT said: “I am glad that Miah admitted to these offences as it was clear that he knew his actions were wrong, yet he continued to commit the same offence again. As someone who taught children the same age as he believed the girls he was talking to were, this would suggest that their young age wasn’t going to stand in the way of his own sexual gratification.
“Online grooming and child sex offences is becoming more and more of a threat, especially now that children have more access to the online world, and we have a dedicated team within Bedfordshire Police who work hard to tackle this.
“We have seen the way that offenders target young children online, groom them and then try and arrange to meet their victims in real life. Thankfully this wasn’t the case, but just because this happened online, it doesn’t make it any less of a crime.
“Any child can become the victim of grooming, no matter what their gender, ethnicity or background. If you think that this might be happening to you or someone you know then it’s important you speak out and tell someone you trust.”
The signs of grooming aren’t always obvious and groomers will often go to great lengths not to be identified.
If a child is being groomed they may:
- be very secretive, including about what they are doing online,
- have older boyfriends or girlfriends,
- go to unusual places to meet friends,
- have new things such as clothes or mobile phones that they can’t or won’t explain,
- have access to drugs and alcohol.
For further information on grooming and child sexual exploitation, including where to go for advice and support, visit www.bedfordshireagainstcse.org or the NSPCC website.
If you have any concerns about the possible sexual abuse of children, please call police immediately on 101, or 999 if someone is at immediate risk of harm.
