A British pervert who arranged to watch babies be abused in the Philippines has been jailed for 18 years.
Alain Collings paid women in Manila £33,000 to abuse at least 46 children and babies while he watched and recorded their suffering at his home in Devon.
Collings directed the abuse as he watched on Skype, telling the children and the women what he wanted them to do.
He also told girls as young as eight that he planned to “pop them” when he returned to the Philippines.
Police experts recovered 102 hours of recorded abuse and were able to identify between 46 girls aged from just two to 15 in 261 movies and 1,975 photographs.
Collings started a relationship with a woman while living in the Philippines and two photographs from 2011 showed him sexually abusing a two-year-old baby.
Collings, aged 39, admitted two offences of sexual assault on a child, five of causing a child to engage in sexual activity, three of arranging sexual offences against children and seven of making or possessing indecent images of children.
He was jailed for 18 years with an eight year extended licence at Exeter Crown Court today (Monday, May 15).
He was also put on the sex offenders register for life and made subject of a Sexual Harm Prevention Order to restrict his access to children after his release.
The judge said: “This is, if not the worst, then one of the worst, cases I have ever come across. For you to take sexual delight from watching the abuse of children in the Philippines seems to be to be quite dreadful.
“It is behaviour that is abhorrent to a civilised society for which you must be punished. It is quite clear these girls suffered physical pain and psychological harm which will affect them in the future.
“Children were abused either by you or under your direction. You set up the abuse and told them what to do while you viewed the footage in your bed.
“There is a suggestion you tried to blame others and minimise your offending. That shows your distorted thinking.
“You are a very troubled and very dangerous individual and I have no doubt you pose a high risk.”
Miss Janice Eagles, prosecuting, said Collings had been married to a Filipino woman but split up and started a relationship with a woman who helped him carry out the offences.
She had four sisters and a large extended family and some of the victims are thought to be related to her.
The woman appears with Collings in the two pictures which showed them abusing the two-year-old in 2011.
He returned to Britain later that year and moved back into the family home with his father and brother. It was then that he started arranging for his girlfriend and other women to abuse children for his depraved enjoyment.
Mr Nicolas Gerasimidis, defending, claimed Collings sent the cash to support his girlfriend and her extended family, rather than to pay for the abuse.
He said: “His thinking was distorted by spending time in the Philippines where they have their own views and acceptance of this sort of behaviour. He tells me attitudes to this type of offending are very different from that in a civilised society.”
After the case Detective Constable Darren White, of the Devon and Cornwall paedophile online investigation team, told Devon Live that safeguarding inquiries were being carried out by the authorities in the Philippines.
He welcomed the 18 year sentence and said: “We will leave no stone unturned in our efforts to being offenders to justice for these horrendous crimes, which often leave vulnerable victims emotionally scarred for the rest of their lives.
“Paedophiles are using increasingly sophisticated methods in order to carry on their offending and we, together with other law enforcement agencies, are also using increasingly sophisticated methods to catch them.”