Sent vile messages to who he thought was a 12-year-old girl.

A Nottingham paedophile has been jailed for attempting to engage in sexual activity with a 12-year-old girl, who was actually an undercover police officer.

Richard Bull, 62, of The Mount, was sentenced to three years and four months in prison after pleading guilty to attempting to cause or incite a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity and attempting to engage a child under 13 to engage in sexual communication.

The court heard that Bull had begun talking to the "girl", who was actually an undercover police officer posing as a 12-year-old named "Dani," on July 4th, 2022, on a social media platform.

Their conversations soon moved to WhatsApp, and Bull began asking for photos of "Dani" in her underwear and photos of her breasts. He also asked if he could be her "virtual boyfriend" and sent her an image of himself, although it was not a sexual image.

The communication stopped on July 20th, 2022, and Bull was arrested on July 27th.

Sentencing Bull, Judge James Sampson said: "You thought you were talking to a real 12-year-old and you were trying to get that child to engage in abusive, sexual activity. In the event, there was no child because this was a police officer posing as a child decoy. The custody threshold has been crossed by some margin and I have no option other than to send you to prison."

In mitigation, Bull's lawyer argued that his client was out of work and "bored" at home, which led to his "wrong element of behavior."

In addition to the prison sentence, Bull was also handed a lifetime sexual harm prevention order and placed on the sex offender register, also for life.