Father jailed for having sex with underage girl

A father who took his children along to meet an underage virgin before having sex with the girl he met through a social networking site was jailed for 10 months today.

Andrew Apolojohanaangels became a “friend” of the girl when she was aged 13 through the Bebo website, the High Court in Edinburgh heard.

Apolojohanaangels, 33, met the youngster at a railway station in the company of his two young children after she turned 14 and took her back to his home in Livingston, in West Lothian, where he had unprotected sex with her.

But his sex offending was uncovered after the girl, who was worried she was pregnant, contacted a cousin by computer seeking advice and her aunt became aware of the nature of the conversation. She phoned the victim’s mother and police were contacted.

First offender Apolojohanaangles, of Rosehill Place, Livingston, was originally charged with raping the teenager at his home in April last year, but the Crown earlier accepted his guilty plea to twice having unlawful sexual intercourse with the underage girl.

Lord Doherty told the father-of-three: “I have not found this an easy case to deal with. This was a serious offence, which in my view, involved a considerable degree of planning on your part.”

But the judge said he had taken into account the plea made on his behalf by defence counsel and his previous good record.

Defence counsel Maggie Scott QC said: “There is no suggestion in this case of any predatory behaviour by the accused or of any grooming.”

“He has expressed his shame and remorse for his involvement in this offence,” she said, adding: “There is nothing to suggest it was anything other than out of character for him.”

During an earlier stage in proceedings the Crown had to go to court to seek a judge’s authority to take fresh DNA samples from him after an appeal ruling made previous ones inadmissible in the case.

The Court of Criminal Appeal had ruled in a separate case that after a person was charged he was under the protection of the court and its authority was required for the taking of such samples.

Mouth swabs were taken from Apolojohanaangels by police after he was charged in a practice that was widespread at the time.

Lord Pentland agreed to grant a warrant for the taking of fresh swabs saying that the difficulty was “entirely unforeseen at the time the evidence was taken by police officers”.

Advocate depute Alison Di Rollo told the judge at the time: “A warrant would remedy a situation where it might be said an accused person has escaped justice on what, on one view, could be considered a technicality.”

Following Apolojohanaangels’ guilty plea prosecutor Tim Niven-Smith said that in 2009 and last year the accused and the victim had profiles on Bebo. They began communicating in the latter part of 2009 via the “Friendzii” application on the site before he gave her his mobile phone number.

He said the girl’s profile which was visible to friends on the site indicated that she a 16-year-old.

In April last year Apolojohanaangels contacted the second-year high school asking her if she wanted to meet up and she arranged to see him.

Mr Niven-Smith said the girl told her parents that she was going to stay the night with a school friend and left home with an overnight bag. She went to a train station where she was met by Apolojohanaangels who was with his two children, then aged five years old and seven months.

They then travelled from Glasgow to Edinburgh before going on to Livingston where when they got to his home he put his two children to bed.

Apolojohanaangels then took the teenager to a bedroom and had sex with her before having intercourse with her again in the morning. The girl then travelled back home before later contacting her cousin via a computer.

Mr Niven-Smith said: “She had not previously engaged in sexual intercourse and was worried that she was pregnant as she had a sore stomach.”

“During this conversation by computer the victim’s aunt became aware of the nature of the conversation between her daughter and her niece and telephoned her mother,” she said.

The girl was taken for a medical examination and was provided with emergency contraception. Swabs were taken and a DNA match was found with the profile of Apolojohanaangels.

He was placed him on the sex offenders’ register.