Teenage sisters searched web for child rape then abducted girl, 2
Girls aged 13 and 14 lured toddler out of her pushchair with sweets, court told
SISTERS aged 13 and 14 attempted to abduct two toddlers from a shop after carrying out internet searches about a ‘poor little thing getting kidnapped and raped’, a court heard.
The children initially tried to trick a mother into walking in the wrong direction when she lost sight of her little girl in a city centre Primark store, but she turned around and found her youngster.
But two hours later, at 4.29pm on April 13, the same girls gave another toddler sweets, took her out of her pushchair and led her away to Haymarket Metro station in Newcastle upon Tyne while her mother was briefly distracted by a phone call.
After taking the two-year-old to South Gosforth, they stole milk and a bottle from a Sainsbury’s store and went to a park as police launched a desperate hunt for the missing girl as darkness descended. In chilling echoes of the Jamie Bulger murder case 23 years ago, police spotted the trio on CCTV walking towards the station.
The sisters were found by police about an hour and 45 minutes later and the apparently unharmed toddler was reunited with her mother.
Yesterday the sisters pleaded guilty to kidnapping when they appeared before North Tyneside Youth Court. The court heard how police investigating the incident discovered a tablet computer they used contained searches for ‘rape’, ‘young people getting raped’ and ‘poor little thing getting kidnapped and raped’.
The girls were originally charged with kidnap with the intention of committing a relevant sexual offence, but this charge was dropped. They pleaded guilty to unlawfully ‘by force or fraud’ taking away the two-year-old against her will. They also admitted stealing dummies, milk and a bottle.
District Judge Roger Elsey said the girls’ tablet computer contained ‘some very concerning material’ that would help experts assess the ‘dangerousness’ they presented. He adjourned sentencing for reports and said he may have to send the case to a crown court judge for sentencing as it involved a ‘grave’ crime.
The sisters were remanded in local authority care until the next court hearing on July 4. The alleged failed abduction bid was described at a previous magistrates court hearing and can now be reported.
Lee Poppett, prosecuting, said the teenagers were playing with a little girl in Primark moments before her mother lost sight of her. One of them approached the mother and said she had seen her girl at the counter. But the mother turned in the opposite direction and spotted her daughter.
Mr Poppett said: ‘The Crown would say it was the same defendants involved.’
Both toddlers were black and the girls’ internet search evidence contained links to ‘African woman sexual activity’. Following the abduction of the two-year-old, the girls were regularly questioned by concerned passengers on the Metro, who were told the toddler was being taken to see her mother.
When the alarm was raised police recognised the description of the girls and suggested searching Gosforth Central Park. The three were found there shortly after 6pm by a community support officer. Neither the defendants nor the victim can be named for legal reasons. The court heard the sisters had no previous convictions or arrests. They come from a large family and have been known to social services for ‘quite some time’.
One of the girls posted a video online appealing for her father to get back in contact with the family. She said she loved him and wanted to see him again.
Until the incident the family lived in a rundown terraced house in Tyneside. A neighbour said the older sister was ‘horrible’ and a bad influence on the younger one.
‘I feel sorry for the mum because she was really nice,’ said the neighbour. ‘The older one was intimidating with the younger kids – she got them to do what she wanted to.’
Chief Superintendent Laura Young of Northumbria Police said: ‘To lose a child, or have a child taken from you in these circumstances, must be every parent’s worst nightmare.
‘I am just glad that we are in a position today where the child is safely back home with her mother.’