THE heartbroken family of a girl sexually abused from the age of four faced the paedophile 'predator' who molested her as he was jailed.

Mathew Churchill, who 'said nothing' in one police interview, had nowhere to hide as members of the victim's family looked him in the eye and spoke out about what they described as his lack of remorse and the 'irrevocable' damage he had caused.

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The 32-year-old of Glanford, Hanley Swan, admitted a string of offences - two sexual assaults on a child under 13 (one a specimen charge reflecting multiple acts of abuse), causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity, three counts of making indecent images of children, possessing extreme pornography, possessing prohibited images of children and taking indecent images of a child.

He was sentenced to five years in prison by Judge Jim Tindal at Worcester Crown Court on Tuesday after admitting the offences when he appeared before magistrates on September 16 last year.

Churchill's abuse of the girl began in February 2012 when she was just four (an assault which he also filmed) and repeated when she was aged 10 or 11.

Adding to the family's pain, the sentence was delayed last October because of a request for a psychiatric report on behalf of Churchill.

Judge Tindal apologised to the victim's family for this delay, saying the wait must have been 'very difficult' for them.

Churchill's advocate, Alun Williams, said the report was sought not by the defendant but by those representing him who felt it 'could assist' because 'he finds it extremely difficult to communicate in relation to this matter'.

However, he also conceded of the psychiatric report: "It does not greatly assist."

We can now bring you more details from the sentence hearing in which family, sitting in the jury box, delivered harrowing accounts of the pain his abuse had caused, referring to Churchill's 'arrogance' and their own 'grief', 'anger' and 'disgust'.

A sister of the victim said: "This is the worst thing I have ever been through in my life. It is hard to articulate the impact this has."

She referred to her sister's 'anxiety' in the wake of the abuse and of the video the defendant had made of the the assault, a video which the prosecution confirmed he had retained for over seven years and edited.

"It breaks me to think she may to have to relive it again at some point. I don't know how we're all going to carry on with our lives" she said.

Speaking in a loud, clear voice and choking back tears, she said: "I feel so guilty I could not protect her. I feel so disgusted by what he did. He's destroyed so many lives."

Going on to describe him as 'a dangerous predator', she said he had done 'irrevocable damage'. "I ask you to impose the maximum sentence in your powers. He showed no mercy to that little girl who was just four years old and he changed her life forever. It's my solemn wish he spends the rest of his life suffering," she said.

Another relative spoke of the victim's night terrors, of her own 'shame and guilt' and how she could no longer look at pictures of the victim as a child as she knew now, as she had not appreciated at the time, that was when the abuse was taking place.

She went on to say: "I can only describe the feeling as grief. I have never felt a feeling like this before."

"Inevitably his actions will cause lasting and lifelong damage upon her" she said.

She added: "He clearly didn't care about the impact his actions were having and will have on her. I have never seen or heard any guilt or remorse from him."

Alun Williams, defending, stressed that it was not the defendant but the child who was the victim.

However, he said of his client 'this has clearly destroyed him'.

He told the court: "He is remorseful - he feels deep shame."

Churchill had pleaded guilty pleas 'at the earliest possible opportunity', he added.

Of the indecent images he told Judge Jim Tindal: "Your Honour will have seen vastly more. That is not to diminish the offending or the seriousness of it."

Mr Williams added: "This has destroyed his life. There will be no coming back from this. This will blight his life forever."

His devices were searched which revealed 32 category A images of children (the most serious within the guidelines), 65 at category B and 229 at category C. In total 269 extreme pornographic images were also discovered and 3,039 prohibited images of children.

The images were found across four different devices. Churchill's abuse came to light in September, 2019 when the victim told her mother that Churchill would 'hug her in a state of undress' when he was 'naked from the waist down'.

Churchill was told he can expect to serve half of the five year sentence in custody and the remaining half on licence in the community. A sexual harm prevention order was made for 10 years, restricting Churchill's contact with children, male and female, and his access to, and use of, internet-enabled devices.

He will also have to sign the sex offender register for life.