Mother issues warning as Facebook killer jailed

THE mother of a teenage girl kidnapped, raped and murdered by a convicted sex offender she met on Facebook questioned last night why he was free to attack her daughter.

Andrea Hall also warned of the dangers of social networking sites after convicted rapist Peter Chapman, 33 – who was also suspected of other attacks – met 17-year-old Ashleigh online.

Yesterday Chapman, who admitted kidnap, rape and murder, was jailed for life and told he would serve at least 35 years.

Speaking after the sentencing, Mrs Hall said she had been powerless to stop Ashleigh going out that fateful night.

“Them sort of people should be tagged and they should be kept an eye on all the time,” she said.

“I blame them for letting them out. He shouldn’t have been let out.”

Mrs Hall, who was comforted by her family and friends, said she was powerless to have stopped Ashleigh going out.

“What could I have done?” she asked. “She was 17. You don’t stop your kids from going out. You tell them to be careful. He was a nice looking boy. I couldn’t have stopped it and I wouldn’t have stopped it.

“The message is for people just to be careful. Please just be careful. Make sure you please do tell somebody if you are going to meet a person.

“That is the message, don’t go on your own.”

Her plea was echoed by Chief Superintendent Andy Reddick who led the murder inquiry.

“The internet is a great thing, but young people who go online can easily fall prey to the scheming, devious tricks of predatory paedophiles and perverts who, sadly, are all too willing to prey on the naive and vulnerable,” he said.

“It is a jungle that is full of pitfalls and traps and that is why companies who set up and promote such sites should do everything in their power to protect those that use them.

Chapman was jailed in 1996 for raping two prostitutes and was also suspected, though never charged, of carrying out other rapes and sex attacks against young women.

Last night Merseyside Police confirmed they waited nine months to put out a national alert after Chapman – who was still on parole – could not be contacted over a traffic offence. Officers had visited his house in Liverpool in January last year but it took until September for the full alert to be issued.

During the trial, the court heard how Chapman created an alter ego of 19-year-old Peter Cartwright on the Facebook and Tagged.com websites to groom the Darlington College childcare student. Once he had made contact – less than a week before her death – he began talking to her using MSN Messaging and sending text messages to her mobile phone.

Prosecutor Graham Reeds QC told Teesside Crown Court: “It is apparent from the very start that he was obsessed with sex and was trying to make arrangements to meet her.”

Mr Reeds said Chapman needed a ruse to get Ashleigh into his car on October 25 last year.

“Having invented 19-year-old Peter to make contact with girls, he now decided to invent Peter’s dad in order to persuade Ashleigh that it was safe to get into his car. The plan he devised was calculated, wicked, and it worked.”

“Having organised the Pete’s dad cover story, having researched the location of the intended crime scene and having just travelled to the area to check it, the defendant had now sprung the trap,” Mr Reeds said. “All he had to do now was wait for her to fall into it.”

After kidnapping Ashleigh, Chapman – who was living in the back of his car – drove her to an area off the A177 at Thorpe Larches, near Sedgefield, County Durham. It was there that he forced her to give him oral sex, before he bound and gagged her and raped her.

“After removing her lower clothing she was gagged with duct tape wound around her face, bound by the forearms with tape and forced into sexual intercourse,” Mr Reeds said. “At some stage the bindings around her arms were removed, most likely to allow her to pull up and fasten her lower clothing. But after the rape her arms were bound up again and further tape was put over her face, suffocating her to death.”

He was arrested the following day for motoring offences. Chapman then led police to where he had dumped Ashleigh’s body, a nearby farmer’s field.

Chapman later confessed to police that he had consensual sex with Ashleigh and she had accidentally suffocated.

Judge Peter Fox, the Recorder of Middlesbrough, jailed Chapman for life and said he would serve at least 35 years imprisonment before being considered for parole.

Judge Fox also imposed concurrent 10-year sentences for rape and kidnap, but imposed no separate penalty for failing to notify a change of address.