Posed as teen to groom girl for sex Paedophile (32) travelled from England with gifts
A paedophile car company boss who repeatedly drove over 270 miles from England to Stirling to meet a 14-year-old and groom her for sex is facing jail.
Matthew Kelsey, 32, posed as a teenager to gain the trust of his vulnerable victim, plied her with presents, and called her his “Pumpkin” and “Princess”.
Then he coaxed her into the back of his black sliding-door van, which he had fitted out with a rug and a bed, and had sex with her twice, Falkirk Sheriff Court was told on Tuesday.
He even met her parents and told them he was 15.
When their besotted daughter told them what she believed was the truth – that Kelsey was a 19-year-old called Alan Thomas – they called the police.
The court heard Kelsey first made contact with the girl through Facebook in 2019, and before long they were messaging each other several times a day.
Ronnie Hay, prosecuting, said: “They discussed their lives and he said he was depressed and wanted to kill himself.
“The girl told him not to do it, that she was also depressed and often self-harmed.
“He told her often that she was beautiful and amazing and she was the only person in the world who could make him happy.
“She sometimes referred to him ‘Dad’.”
After role-playing sex on Facebook with the girl, he met her for the first time five months later, driving up to a village outside Stirling, where the offences took place.
Mr Hay said: “They sat on a bench and he hugged her and whispered in her ear that she had a lovely body.
“He told her he loved her and gave her a silver-gold bracelet with an inscription referring to her as his ‘queen’.”
A few days later he coaxed her into his van because it was raining, and they sat down on the bed where he gave her a rose before touching her legs and bottom and putting his fingers inside her shorts.
He turned up in his van again a few days later, and she agreed to let him have sex with her.
Mr Hay said Kelsey had sex with the girl twice and on neither occasion did he wear a condom.
In January this year the girl told her mother Kelsey was visiting her that day, and her mother said it was time she met him. The girl had told her mother Kelsey was 15.
Mr Hay said: “On meeting the accused the mother was shocked and said ‘he’s not 15’ but the accused said he was.
“She laid down ground rules including no sex and no touching, and they went back to his van. The girl’s mother was uneasy and phoned her daughter who told her Kelsey was 19, and the mother instructed her daughter to return home.”
Kelsey then gave the girl a bag of presents and a cuddly toy and “left abruptly”.
Mr Hay said on the way home the girl was so upset she selfas harmed, before disclosing to her mother that she and Kelsey had sex.
The mother phoned police, and Humberside Police forced entry to his home and arrested him.
The court heard that the girl had since had trouble sleeping, and suicidal thoughts.
Unmarried Kelsey, of Saltgrounds Road, Brough, in Yorkshire’s East Riding, appeared by video link from Low Moss Prison, East Dunbartonshire, where he has been on remand since his arrest.
He pleaded guilty to having sexual intercourse with the girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, and sending her sexual communications. The offences were committed between in 2019 and January 2020.
The court heard Kelsey was convicted in 2012 of inciting a girl under the age of 16 to engage in sexual activity - at the time he was working as a piano teacher and he picked up a girl pupil in his vehicle and kissed her on the mouth. For that offence, which he pleaded guilty to, he was placed under supervision for 24 months.
Defence solicitor Ken Dalling said: “Mr Kelsey is aware a significant custodial sentence is inevitable.”
Placing Kelsey on the sex offenders’ register and continuing Kelsey’s remand, Sheriff Simon Collins QC said: “This is plainly a case where reports will be required.”
He will be sentenced on September 1.
According to Companies House, Kelsey is managing director and majority shareholder of a used car company MK Autos Ltd.