East Lothian man Jamie Shiel jailed after ordering mother to sexually abuse her own daughter

Jamie Shiel made contact with the woman on the Kik messenger app and instructed her to strip her teenage daughter naked and to carry out horrific sex acts on her.

Shiel, 23, also told the woman’s daughter to carry out a sex act on her dog and simulate oral sex with a hairbrush during the shocking online contact in 2022.

A sheriff described Shiel’s depraved behaviour as “sickening and degrading” and jailed him for 37 months and placed him on the Sex Offenders Register for life during a court hearing this week.

Other 3rd party

Sheriff Matthew Auchincloss said: “I assess your level of culpability as really high and I also assess the level of harm to the child in charges four, five and seven as really high.

“To encourage a mother to abuse her own daughter is both sickening and degrading and I have no doubt you have caused harm to the victims and that harm may well be long lasting.

“There is no other appropriate method of dealing with you other than a custodial sentence.”

Edinburgh Sheriff Court was told police raided Shiel’s home in Musselburgh, East Lothian, after receiving information he had uploaded indecent images of children to a Snapchat account in July 2022.

Shiel was present with his mother and father when police arrived and an initial search of his phone showed he had downloaded around 50 indecent images of children aged between two and 12 years old.

Fiscal depute Oliver Davidson-Richards said hundreds of images and videos depicting the sexual abuse of young male and female victims were subsequently found on the device. 

The court also heard Shiel had shared indecent images of children to several accounts he was in contact with on the Kik messenger app in March and April 2022.

Mr Davidson-Richards said police officers then discovered Shiel had been sending sexual messages and images of his penis to six children he was in contact with on social media site Snapchat.

Sick chat logs showed Shiel had ordered one victim to carry out a vile sex act on her dog, simulate oral sex using a hairbrush and send him pictures of her genitalia.

The court was told the offender was also in contact with the girl’s mother and he had demanded she sexually molest her daughter and send him images to prove she had in April 2022.

Shiel pleaded guilty to five offences when he appeared at the capital court last month and he returned to the dock for sentencing on Tuesday.

Shiel pleaded guilty to possessing indecent images of children and to distributing indecent images of children to others at his home, all between July 2021 and July 2022.

He also admitted sending sexual images and sexual written communication to who he believed were six children aged between 13 and 16 between February and July 2022.

Shiel pleaded guilty to intentionally causing who he believed to be a child aged between 13 and 16 to participate in sexual activity on various occasions between February 10 and June 30, 2022.

And he admitted a fifth offence of, while acting with another, engaging in sexual activity with who believed to be a child aged between 13 and 16 on April 14, 2022.