A children’s entertainer known as “Professor Paulos” could spend the rest of his life behind bars after he was unmasked as a “predatory paedophile” who treated young girls and toddlers “like little sex slaves” whilst filming himself abusing them

Magician Paul McKee, who was well-known in the Wirral area, subjected seven victims to a catalogue of sickening abuse over the course of nearly 25 years.

The 57-year-old had to be extradited back to the UK from Thailand in order to face justice over his horrific crimes.

A trial at Liverpool Crown Court heard that his offending persisted between the mid-1980s and late noughties, with some of the children only being toddlers at the time they were abused and many of the assaults being filmed with a camcorder.

Gareth Roberts, prosecuting, described McKee – of no fixed address, but formerly of Wallasey Village – as a “serial abuser of children”, with many of the details of his attacks being too graphic to publish.

His perverted behaviour was eventually reported to the police in 2017. In their “harrowing, dark and disturbing” accounts, the complainants described how he “treated them like little sex slaves” when they were aged as young as two.

McKee, a Mormon who was said to be “from a religious family with strong links to the Church of the Latter Day Saints”, was by now living in Thailand and had to be returned to this country in order to face a jury.

When his brother messaged him on Facebook after learning of the allegations, the serial sex offender replied saying he was “sorry for what he had and done and was asking for God’s forgiveness”.

Mr Roberts today told the court that he was a “predatory paedophile capable of extreme acts of violence against very young children” and had subjected the girls to a “prolonged, vicious campaign of abuse”.

The prosecutor detailed gratuitous acts of “brutal and profound degradation” which were “designed to emasculate and humiliate”.

McKee was convicted of 13 child sexual offences, including rape and sexual assault, after a trial as well as being cleared of two further counts.

Appearing via video link to HMP Liverpool, he was jailed for 30 years – a term of which he must serve at least two thirds before becoming eligible for release – this afternoon, Monday, and handed an additional four-year licence period.

Sentencing, Judge David Swinnerton said: “You were highly emotionally manipulative, controlling and physically violent. You systematically and repeatedly subjected them all to an appalling catalogue of sexual abuse and rape.

“Throughout the trial, the pain and psychological damage that you have caused to those seven women was raw and obvious. I once again pay tribute to them for their strength in coming forward and their determination and courage in giving evidenc

“You, on the other hand, have shown not one sign of remorse. You do not seem to experience shame, guilt, remorse or empathy – you acted on your own sexual desires with no care for the traumatic impact on the children you abused.”

One woman left the courtroom in floods of tears saying “I’m going to pay someone to kill him, I want the f***ing b****** dead” as the judge passed sentence.

McKee was also handed a restraining order preventing him from contacting his victims indefinitely, as well as a lifelong sexual harm prevention order.