London paedophile drove to Wakefield to meet 12-year-old girl 'just for KFC'

Salman Raf continued to deny any sexual interest in children after being snared by an undercover officer posing as a youngster online. Once arrested he claimed he was due to meet a friend in Dewsbury and had only arranged to meet the girl for an hour at the fast-food restaurant, Leeds Crown Court heard.

The 32-year-old had made contact with the alleged child's profile on Kik messaging app in June of last year. She told him she was only 13, but later "confessed" that she was only 12. He lied and said he was 27. In a decoy picture she sent, she was wearing a school uniform and he called her "cute". Over the course of several weeks they spoke over Snapchat and WhatsApp and Raf asked if she had a boyfriend and any experience, sexually. Raf, of Memorial Close, Hounslow, also asked her if she was a virgin.

He told her not to tell her mother and asked about meeting up, when her mother was at work. He also sent her a picture of himself semi-naked in a hotel room.

On August 1 he made the journey to West Yorkshire and was arrested. He later admitted attempted sexual communication with a child, and attempting to meet a girl under 16 following grooming. He has no previous convictions.

Mitigating, Michael Collins said: "He has lost his good character, his career and the relationship with his family may be destroyed forever. There was no victim, but the losses to this defendant have been incalculable."

Judge Ray Singh told Raf: "You are a bright, educated, professional individual and you decided to start communicating, repeatedly and intensely, with an individual you believed to be 13, and later believed she was 12.

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"You constantly asked her for more photos. You offered her money and suggested meeting at a hotel. You lived a considerable distance away and you drove to Wakefield in order to pick her up and undoubtedly commit a serious sexual offence on a child.

"There was no other reason for you to do so. You told the police you had no interest in children."

He gave him 15 months' jail, suspended for 24 months, and told him to enrol on a 43-day sexual accredited programme, plus 55 rehabilitation days.

He was also put on the sex offender register for 10 years, and given a 10-year sexual harm prevention order (SHPO) to limit his internet use.