January 2023

Man jailed for grooming 13-year-old girl

A man has been jailed after engaging in sexually explicit chat and then attempting to meet up with a 13-year-old girl.

Bartosz Zaczek, 23, of St Albans Road, St Annes, instigated the chat online in May 2022.

He believed he was talking with a 13-year-old, but it was actually an undercover police officer.

Over a period of just over a month he sent sexually explicit messages, including images, to the ‘girl’.

He also suggested they meet up and over the course of the chat he encouraged her to enlist another girl – a fictional 12 -year-old cousin – to meet up with him too.

On June 28^th he told his boss he was going to run an errand, but instead travelled to Blackburn to meet up with the person he had been speaking with online.

He was met at the location by officers and arrested.

In October 2022 he pleaded guilty to:

– Arranging/facilitating the commission of a child sex offence,

– Attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child,

– Attempting to incite a child to engage in sexual activity,

– Two counts of attempting to cause a child to look at an image of sexual activity

– Attempting to meet a child following sexual grooming.

He appeared at Preston Crown Court yesterday (Wednesday, January 25^th) where he was sentenced to four years and two months in prison.

He has also been given a 10 year Sexual Harm Prevention Order (SHPO) and has been told he must sign the sex offenders register indefinitely.

An order has also been made for his phone to be destroyed.