A CWMANN man has been jailed after admitting sending 'vile and explicit' messages to someone he thought was a 12-year-old girl.

Jonathan Strain, 37, of 5 Treherbert Street, has been jailed for a total of four years and seven months at Swansea Crown Couty after he was caught engaging in sexual conversations online with what he thought was a schoolgirl.

He was in fact talking to a volunteer with a paedophile hunter group.

The court heard that between 12 October 2021 and 9 February 2022, the defendant engaged in sexually explicit conversations with an online profile, encouraging what he thought was a 12-year-old girl to perform sex acts on herself, and sent her videos of himself masturbating.

Strain also said he was looking "for horny girls who want video call fun" and offered to buy the child a mobile phone with a camera, and said he wanted to "trade" nude photographs.

The court heard that during one conversation the defendant asked the girl if she had school the next day and told her not to tell any of her friends about what was going on as it was their "secret".

In March 2022, members of the paedophile hunter group went to the defendant’s address, but he was not home, so details were passed to the police and he was arrested later that evening.

Strain pleaded guilty to causing a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity and attempting to cause a child to watch a sexual act.

Judge Huw Rees said Strain had engaged in "vile and explicit conversations" and told the defendant he had an "unhealthy and deviant interest in pre-teenage girls".

Strain was sentenced to four years and seven months in prison, of which he will serve half before being released on licence.

He will remain on the sex offender register for the rest of his life.