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Kent photographer faces multiple life sentences for Malaysia child abuse British paedophile faces life in jail for prolific child abuse in Malaysia
(about 2 hours later)
One of Britain’s most prolific paedophiles is facing multiple life sentences for a catalogue of crimes against Malaysian children. Freelance photographer Richard Huckle, 30, from Ashford in Kent, admitted to an unprecedented number of offences against children aged between six months and 12 years from 2006 to 2014. He bragged about these crimes on the “dark web”. One of Britain’s most prolific paedophiles is facing multiple life sentences after he posed as an English teacher to target, groom and abuse Malaysian babies and young children.
Twenty-three children from mainly poor Christian communities in the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, were identified in 91 charges, though it is believed that Huckle may have abused up to 200 young victims. Huckle posed as an English teacher in order to dupe the victims’ families. Richard Huckle, 30, a photographer from Ashford, Kent, admitted an “unprecedented and exceptional” 71 offences against children aged between six months and 12 years from 2006 to 2014.
Details of the abuse can be reported now because investigators had sought a court order allowing time to make sure the victims were safe from other online sexual predators. He had faced 91 charges, with 23 children from mainly poor Christian communities in Malaysia’s capital, Kuala Lumpur, identified, though investigators believe he abused up to 200 young victims after persuading their families he was a respectable Christian philanthropist.
Huckle, a practising Christian, first visited Malaysia on a teaching gap year when he was 18 or 19 and went on to groom children while doing voluntary work. He was arrested as he arrived at Gatwick airport in London by National Crime Agency officials on 19 December 2014 as he came home for Christmas. Of one, he bragged: “I’d hit the jackpot, a three-year-old girl as loyal to me as my dog and nobody seemed to care,” the Old Bailey heard.
The organisation uncovered numerous indecent pictures and videos Huckle took of himself abusing the girls and boys during his visits to south-east Asia. More than 20,000 indecent images were found on his computer. His catalogue of abuse stretched back to when he was 19 and on a gap year, teaching in south-east Asia. After his arrest, more than 20,000 obscene images of boys and girls taken during his visits to the far east were found on his computer.
Huckle wrote a paedophile manual as well as a “paedopoints ledger” in which he detailed rapes and various sex acts. The manual was on an encrypted space on Huckle’s laptop ready for publication on the dark web. Described as a “constant groomer”, he boasted about his crimes on the “dark web”. He put together a 60-page manual, Paedophiles and Poverty: Child Love Guide, on how to select deprived victims and avoid detection, which was found encrypted on his laptop and which he planned to publish online. He wanted to create a “Paedo Wiki guide”, the court heard.
His ledger was a private record of the children he had abused in which he turned the various indecent activities into a game. Under the rules, he could not “score” for the same activity for the same child in the same week. The ledger was also on an encrypted part of his laptop, and he had written about the activities on a members-only paedophile site, which has since been closed down. The laptop also contained a “Pedopoints” ledger, a game he devised awarding himself different points for 15 different levels of depravity on children, which he rated from “basic” to “hardcore”, and which he also wrote about on a paedophile website.
Huckle was also accused of attempting to crowdfund his abuse online using bitcoin. He attempted to crowdfund his abuse online using bitcoin, posting footage of a three-year-old girl and making 105% of the target funding, the court heard.
Last January Huckle pleaded not guilty to all 91 charges, but shortly before his trial in April he admitted to 71 of the offences over the course of five hearings. At his first plea hearing at the Old Bailey in London, it took more than an hour to read out all the charges. One charge stated that he published an advert online to sell or distribute indecent photos for his crowdfunding campaigns in the autumn of 2014. Arrested at Gatwick airport by National Crime Agency (NCA) officials when he returned home for Christmas in 2014, he initially pleaded not guilty to all 91 charges, then gradually admitted 71 counts.
At an earlier hearing, Judge Peter Rook QC said: “You have pleaded guilty to 71 counts. As you know, these amount to sexual offending of the utmost gravity, and as a result I am considering life sentences in your case. The NCA was tipped off about Huckle as part of an international police operation in late 2014, and after analysing his online posts and photographs, concluded the majority of his victims were being abused in Malaysia, although one was targeted in Cambodia. He was charged under legislation allowing a British suspect to be charged for crimes abroad.
“I am also considering the minimum sentence you must serve. In any event, you must expect a very long sentence in this case, given that it comes into the category of cases of exceptional gravity. As everyone in this court will know, there is no distinction made between victims here or victims overseas. The cases are regarded as of the utmost gravity in both cases.” On paedophile forums, he boasted: “Impoverished kids are definitely much, much easier to seduce than middle-class western kids; I still plan to publish a guide on this subject.” He said poorer families were impressed by his “high status”.
Twenty-two of the offences he pleaded guilty to carry discretionary life sentences, and 18 of these were multiple incident counts. Some of the charges were for rape, and there were 31 sexual assaults, six grooming offences, and 12 counts of taking multiple photographs. He targeted and groomed the children of deprived families, impressing them with his “relative wealth and status as a westerner”, said prosecutor Brian O’Neill QC.
Brian O’Neill QC, prosecuting, said: “The admitted abuse includes almost every conceivable aggravating feature. Accordingly, having considered the pleas offered, tendered and now entered by this defendant, the crown is of the view that they are an adequate reflection of his criminality and the offences to which he has pleaded guilty inform the court sufficiently for sentencing. Of the charges, 14 were for rape, five digital penetration, 31 sexual assaults, six grooming children to expose or touch themselves or other children sexually, 12 for taking photographs and one of arranging or facilitating child sex offences relating to the manual.
” O’Neill said the admitted abuse meant public interest did not require a trial on the outstanding 20 counts, which could lie on file.
Huckle appeared before the Old Bailey on Wednesday for his sentencing, which is expected to conclude on Friday. Born and brought up in Britain, Huckle was described as a loner spending his teenage years on his computer before travelling to south-east Asia. His earliest recorded abuse, when he was 19, involved a two-year-old in Cambodia, though his other victims were in Malaysia. Some were abused over many years, and groomed to abuse each other.
“Frequently the abuse included taking photographs of those children, editing them to achieve anonymity and uploading still and moving images and graphic details of his exploits to the paedophile network TLZ [The Love Zone, since closed down] on the hidden internet also known as the ‘dark web’,” said O’Neill.
His sentencing hearing, which began on Wednesday, is expected to last until Friday. At an earlier hearing, Judge Peter Rook QC, warned him the counts he had admitted to “amount to sexual offending of the utmost gravity and as a result I am considering life sentences in your case”.
Huckle’s parents sold the family home and disappeared soon after his arrest. His sister-in-law told Sky News: “None of his family will speak about him. None of us ever want to see Richard again.”
Sky News also contacted Richard’s friends. Scott Chapman, who was at grammar school with him, and later at college, described Huckle as a loner, but not unusual. He said: “He never seemed off or anything like that. He just seemed like a normal person, just very quiet, didn’t really talk about home or things like that.”
When Chapman was shown the charge sheet showing what his friend had admitted to, he was briefly speechless and then said: “I’m genuinely shocked. I’m shaking. It makes you feel sick. A couple of the other guys we were friends with have kids in this age range. They are a little bit older than mine but he may have even been around our friends’ kids at this age.”
Senior officer James Traynor said Huckle was a “predatory paedophile” who “based his whole life around the sexual abuse of children, around the grooming of adults in order to gain access to their children”. Investigators believe there are more of his victims in south-east Asia.
Deputy head of operations, Det Supt Matthew Long, said Huckle was “one of the most committed, manipulative, conniving paedophiles” they had encountered.
Tony Cook, head of operations at Child Exploitation and Online Protection (Ceop) said: “There is no doubt that the quantity and quality of the offending of this particular individual would have increased had he not been arrested. He is only 30 years of age, so we can only imagine what sort of offending he had in front of him.”