A MAN from St Leonards who preyed on young girls using an online messaging app has been jailed.
Anthony Everton, 35, contacted girls aged between 13 and 15 via Snapchat while posing to be a child himself.
Exchanging phone numbers with the girls, he would then request they send him sexually explicit images before threatening to send those images to their families.
Everton would call and text the victims to engage in sexual conversations. If they tried to stop speaking with him, he would make threats to kill them or burn their houses down.
After receiving reports from parents who had intervened in the activity, police arrested Everton in April 2023.
He was released on bail with strict conditions while enquiries, including analysis of his digital devices, continued.
Despite Everton’s attempts to destroy his mobile phone when he was arrested, police found evidence of indecent images and videos on it, including a large number of explicit images of a girl that Everton had sent to her relatives via social media.
In September 2023 while this investigation was ongoing, police began receiving multiple reports of a man masturbating in the front window of an address in St John’s Road, St Leonards. The man was in full view of the public and a nearby children’s playground.
Police identified the address as that of Anthony Everton and he was further arrested.
Everton was subsequently charged with 12 offences, one count of outraging public decency; seven counts of engaging in sexual communication with a child; and four counts relating to the possession and distribution of indecent images of children.
He was found guilty at Brighton Crown Court on 19 March, 2024. At Hove Crown Court on Friday, July 19, he was handed an 11-year sentence consisting of six years in prison and a further five years on extended licence.
He was also issued with an indefinite Sexual Harm Prevention Order and will be on the Sex Offenders’ Register for life.
Investigating officer DC Auryn Liddiard said: “Anthony Everton was persistent in identifying and contacting young girls who he would then exploit and manipulate for his own sexual gratification.
“His behaviour was intended to intimate and distress, and I’d like to thank each of his victims for being brave enough to support our investigation and give evidence against him.
“Sexual Harm Prevention Orders are an important tool to help us protect our victims and the community, and this indefinite order will ensure we are able to closely monitor Everton’s activity even after he is released from prison.”
