A PEADOPHILE who met up with an underage girl at Machynlleth train station has been jailed for nine and a half years.

Mark Owen, 49, wept as he was told by a judge on Wednesday that he was a high risk to any girl aged under 16.

Owen met the girl at the town’s railway station and kissed and cuddled her.

But Swansea Crown Court heard there was no doubt his plans involved having sexual intercourse with her and even making her pregnant.

Owen, from Caerphilly, was under licence from prison and the subject of a restraining order at the time for previous sexual offences against underage girls.

But, said Judge Peter Heywood, that did not stop him from making contact with the girl over the internet.

Her mother became annoyed to find she had exceeded her mobile telephone messages allowance for the second month running.

She examined the phone and was “horrified and alarmed” to discover messages her daughter and Owen had swapped.

She sent Owen a message of her own and telephoned him to tell him she would contact the police.

Judge Heywood said Owen had shared more than 1,400 messages or conversations with the girl, including 161 on 26 September 2015, the day he travelled to Machynlleth to meet her.

They included messages, from him to her, reading, “I can imagine what it will be like on Saturday. Straight to the woods and we’ll do it in the woods.

“We would be at it all night. How many babies would you want, honey?”

Sexual intercourse did not take place that day, added Judge Heywood, but it was clear that in the days following, Owen made more arrangements to meet up.

After his arrest he denied contacting the girl at all.

But CCTV cameras had filmed him in Machynlleth even though he had pulled up a hood and put on sunglasses.

Judge Heywood said that even while in jail on remand Owen wrote to the girl asking her to send him photographs of her.

When police spoke to him about that he again denied responsibility, but a handwriting expert could prove he had written the letter.

Owen admitted sexual activity with a girl aged under 16, breaching the terms of his licence from prison and a sexual harm prevention order.

The court heard that in 2006 Owen had been made the subject of a community order for sexual activity with three girls aged under 13.

In 2009 he was jailed for five years for sexual activity with a girl aged under 16 and breaching the terms of the previous sentence, with an extended licence period of three years.

Judge Heywood said Owen was clearly a dangerous offender.

Because of the threats he had made against the Machynlleth girl she had become too afraid to leave her home even though she had been told he was in prison.

“You are highly predatory and have a deviant interest in young girls,” he added.

Owen was jailed for nine and a half years and told he could not even apply for parole until he had served six years and four months.