A paedophile claimed he had been abducted by a masked gang who downloaded child pornography on his phone in a desperate bid to hide his crime.

Kaewan Salih, 29, was jailed on Monday for 26 months after he shared a three-minute child rape video with four people via Whatsapp earlier this year.

But Hull Crown Court heard when asked by police why he thought they were at his address, he told them a gang had taken his phone and "didn't know what happened after that".

Prosecutor Julian Jones told the court: "It was actually Facebook who had flagged up this account of suspicious activity with one of it's consumer's accounts. This then led police to the door of this defendant.

"He said he had been abducted by five people where his phone had been unlocked and then given back to him.

Hull Crown Court
Hull Crown Court

"However, it was through his IP address that it was later found that the phone belonged to him."

The court heard Salih had sent the image to four different numbers, with one linked to a woman in Warsaw, Poland.

However, when asked by police officers during interview he said he "was drunk and couldn't remember what happened".

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Humberside Police officers paid Salih a visit at his home which he shared with his wife in Snaith at around 8.20pm and took his phone on February 22 this year.

He had also Googled search terms such as 'naughty school girls', 'girl naked on school bus' and other explicit phrases which included the words 'young teen'.

Mr Jones told the court the Iranian national had put his head in the sand but later changed his pleas to guilty.

He admitted one charge of making an indecent image of a child and four charges of distributing the same images.

Edward Moss, defending, told the court: "His wife sits in the public gallery and he is Iranian. He has shown remorse and shame as he knows this passes the custody threshold."

Jailing him for 26 months, Judge Paul Watson, QC, told him: "You searched for terms involving young children and it is that distribution to make it so serious that I must go against the recommendation in the report and sentence you to an immediate prison sentence."

Salih, now of St John's Road, Rotherham, was also subjected to a sexual harm prevention order for the next 10 years.

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