Met Police officer tried to meet 'girl' on duty, jury told

Det Con Francois Olwage was suspended from the Met Police's counter-terrorism unit after his arrest

A Met Police officer arranged to meet a 13-year-old girl for sex while he was "on duty working from home", a court heard.

Det Con Francois Olwage, 52, from Stevenage, Hertfordshire, allegedly spoke to the "girl" for two weeks before trying to meet.

The court heard the girl was in fact an undercover police officer.

Mr Olwage, a counter-terrorism officer, denies a number of child sex offences at Winchester Crown Court.

Peter Shaw, prosecuting, told the jury that at the start of the trial, Olwage pleaded guilty to an offence of improperly exercising his police powers and privileges in order to receive the "benefit of sexual gratification".

The court heard Mr Olwage had started explicit sexual conversations with the "girl" in October before suggesting they meet in what she said was her hometown of Basingstoke, Hampshire.

Mr Shaw said the divorced father-of-three had taken the train to meet the girl, who went by the username Smile Bear, on 28 October and was arrested after stopping at a McDonalds.

On that day he was listed as "on duty working from home", Mr Shaw said,

When officers searched his bag they found condoms, a bottle of lubricant and a packet of erectile dysfunction tablets, the jury heard.

Mr Olwage said he had not specifically packed the bag but it was his travel bag for work trips, holidays or dates.

'Very confused'

Mr Olwage said that he enjoyed "fantasy roleplaying" and he believed Smile Bear was an adult because her profile stated she was 18 and she was actually playing a role as a child.

Describing his response to her saying she was 13, Mr Olwage said that he was working "on the assumption this was a fake profile".

He said that when he spoke to an undercover police officer posing as the "girl" on the phone, he thought it was a "young woman in her mid-20s".

When asked if he would have had sex with the "girl" if she had actually existed, he said: "No, I would have been very confused, tried to find out from her what was going on, why she was there.

"There are certain practices as police officers that we have to do if we find a vulnerable child, I would have to contact local police."

Mr Olwage denies engaging in sexual communication with a child and attempting to cause/incite a girl aged 13 to engage in sexual activity and attempting to meet a girl under the age of 16 following sexual grooming.

The jury was ordered by Judge Jane Miller QC to find Mr Olwage not guilty of another charge of arranging/facilitating the commission of a child sex offence.

The trial continues.