A pervert who arranged to meet a ‘teenage girl’ for sex was caught out by paedophile hunters for a second time.
Michael Edge was jailed for a year back in 2018 for attempting to meet a 12-year-old girl after sending vile, sexualised grooming messages. He had to be locked up for his own safety after being confronted by hunters outside his own doorstep in Stockport. Angry parents descended on his home after seeing the ‘sting’ broadcast on Facebook.
Despite this, Edge was again caught trying to meet an underage girl for sex. During initial conversations with the ‘14-year-old girl’, who was actually an adult woman posing as a child, Edge sought to ‘gain assurances’ that he was ‘not being set up’.
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He has now been jailed for two-and-a-half years after being hauled before a judge again. Prosecuting, Anthony Williams told Manchester Crown Court that two adult women who were part of the paedophile hunter group were contacted by Edge last year, while they were both posing as 14-year-old girls online using different aliases.
His conversations with both ‘girls’, which took place in September and October, soon turned sexual. Eventually Edge arranged to meet up with one of them in Newton Heath.
But instead he was confronted by members of the paedophile hunter group. The police were called and Edge was arrested.
Defending, Ellie Akhgar said of the defendant: “He genuinely wants to work to an offence free future. He genuinely wants to understand himself better so that he does not find himself in this place again.”
Michael Edge pictured when he was caught out by paedophile hunters for the first time -Credit:Justice4Kids/ Cavendish Press
Sentencing, Judge Nicholas Dean KC told Edge: “In the autumn of last year, you engaged in an offence of a type you have been involved in before. This is, as I understand it, how you were caught before.
“You took some steps at the outset of the conversation to try to gain assurances that you were talking to a child rather than paedophile hunters. Ultimately you made arrangements to try to meet.
“That of course came to nothing. It seems to me very clear your intentions in deciding to meet her were to have sexual intercourse with her.”
Edge, of Oldway Walk, Newton Heath, pleaded guilty to two counts of attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child and one count of attempting to meet a child under 16 following grooming.