'Manipulative' paedophile who went to Farnborough Railway Station with cans of Strongbow cider to meet girl, who he asked to travel 100 miles, busted by undercover police officer

Robert Ive, 42, arranged to greet what he believed to be a 14-year-old at Farnborough Railway Station on May 31.

The girl’s profile was actually being controlled by a police officer.

Ive, of Camberley, Surrey, started talking with the suspected girl online on May 18.

The responder immediately said she was 14.

Unperturbed by this, Ive asked her about the sexual acts she has performed, and asked her to do them.

He groomed the child into travelling 100 miles from Leicestershire to Hampshire, so she could stay with him and have sex.

Ive told her how to travel without people becoming suspicious.

He pretended to be the girl’s friend’s dad in a phone call to her ‘mum’, who was another undercover officer.

Ive arrived at the station with cans of Strongbow cider, but was greeted by a police officer, who stepped off the train and arrested him.

At Winchester Crown Court, on August 11, Ive pleaded guilty.

SEE ALSO: Couple who sailed 34,000 miles around the globe and got stuck in New Zealand for a year due to Covid back in Portsmouth after four years

The predator was imprisoned fir four years and eight months arranging/facilitating the commission of a child sex offence and breaching a Sexual Harm Prevention Order.

PC Kirsti Innes, of the Internet Child Abuse Team, said: ‘Robert Ive is a manipulative sexual offender who has various other convictions for child sex offences and attempted to meet who he thought was a 14 year old child for his own sexual gratification.

‘Our specially trained officers are experienced in tracking these types of offenders and bringing them to justice.

‘Had it not been for the work of dedicated officers this man could have gone on to groom a real child instead of being behind bars.’