Paedophile jailed for further offences linked to previously-jailed woman
A convicted paedophile has been sentenced for further offences which link him to a woman who has been jailed for life for child abuse.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said that Paul Pickerill, 66, from Runcorn, had been communicating via WhatsApp messages with Vicki Bevan, from St Helens.
Bevan, 37, was jailed along with Paul Rafferty, 62, and Tony Hutton, 42, at Liverpool Crown Court in May for the systematic abuse of a girl under 10 years of age over a two-year period from 2019 until 2021.
Pickerill was being investigated for other sexual offences when his mobile phone was seized at his home on 5 April 2021.
On this and other electronic devices, police found 141 indecent images and videos of children. There were also thousands of messages between Pickerill and Bevan where they discussed the assault, injury, and sexual abuse of children.
The messages were said to be of an extremely distressing nature.
Pickerill was interviewed in prison in Doncaster about the messages with Bevan. He was further arrested and charged. On 25 August 2022, at Chester Crown Court, he pleaded guilty to intentionally encouraging Vicki Bevan to commit sexual offences against children under 13 which she went on to commit.
Today, 21 October 2022, he was sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment, ten years custodial and five years on licence.
He is the subject of a Sexual Harm Prevention Order for life, must sign on the Sexual Offenders register for life, is barred from working with children for life and his phone will be seized and destroyed.
Senior Crown Prosecutor Pauline Newrick, of CPS Mersey Cheshire, said: “This has been a very distressing case for the whole prosecution team as there were communications between Pickerill and Bevan that no one should have to read.
"The content of those messages clearly shows the depths to which Pickerill was prepared go to in encouraging another person to sexually abuse very young children.
"Bevan herself has been convicted and sentenced because of these messages and others coming to light.
"Without perpetrators like Pickerill, who enable other paedophiles, the abuse of children would not be so extensive. I am pleased that he has been given such a substantial sentence. His imprisonment will no doubt protect other possible victims from this dreadful abuse."