Woman’s deal to prostitute granddaughter ‘just fantasy’
A Lower Hutt woman making plans to prostitute her granddaughter swapped naked photos of the child for a phone top-up.
The plans came to light only when the man she was arranging to prostitute the girl to was arrested for grooming a teenager.
Both the grandmother and the man, Andrew Davie, have admitted entering into a deal to sexually exploit a child, but both argue they had no intention of following through.
Davie, who has no previous convictions, came to police attention after approaching a 14-year-old girl at a library saying he was a talent scout and wanted to photograph her wearing lingerie for a modelling agency.
Despite admitting a charge of meeting with a girl after sexual grooming, Davie said in a disputed facts hearing in the Wellington District Court that he had no sexual interest in the girl and didn’t ask her to pose in lingerie.
He met her a day after their first encounter, and she brought her mother. Davie asked to meet her again without her mother present.
Police intercepted him at the third meeting and discovered a collection of text messages showing his plans to pay for sex with another child.
The 10-year-old victim’s grandmother cannot be named, to protect the identity of the child, who does not know about the offending.
The woman, who is a prostitute and knew Davie as a client, began arranging in May last year to bring the girl to him so he could touch her and possibly have sex with her.
The grandmother sent Davie photos she had taken some time earlier of the child naked in the bath.
Davie paid to top up her phone so she would send him the pictures.
The Crown said the abuse never got a chance to play out because Davie was caught grooming the teen, but Davie claims he never intended to go through with the plan.
He said he knew the grandmother would never follow through either.
In cross-examination on Friday, he said he had no sexual interest in children, despite sending graphic texts describing the sexual things he wanted to do to kids aged 8 to 16.
He said if someone said something to him in a conversation he would always say something worse so the fantasy would escalate. “If somebody had said ‘I’ve been with a 4-year-old’, I’d say ‘I’ve been with a 3-year-old’.”
But detailed texts between the pair show them discussing payment for the girl, with Davie first offering $1000, and the grandmother saying she wanted a cheap, reliable car.
They discuss how Davie can gain the girl’s trust, whether she needs to take time off school, and that they should go shopping to buy her a bra and underwear set so Davie would have an excuse to see her in it.
He had earlier spoken about a transgender person, Morgana Platt, from Palmerston North, who had planned to train a child for sexual exploitation. His text messages show he sent the nude photos of the girl to Platt and discussed having Platt come over when the girl and her grandmother were there.
A search of Davie’s computer revealed a bestiality video and a written story about incest with children.
The grandmother was found to have bestiality images as well.
Her defence lawyer said the grandmother’s role as an escort involved engaging in sexual fantasies when corresponding with clients.
The hearing was for Judge Jan Kelly to decide if it was an aggravating feature of the offending that the pair would have gone through with it, or whether it was not an aggravating feature because, as the defence said, it was only ever a fantasy.
She has reserved her decision.