Mark Page: Former Radio 1 DJ guilty of child sex offences

Mark Page told the court he was a victim of hacking

A former Radio 1 DJ has been found guilty of trying to arrange the sexual abuse of children in the Philippines.

Mark Page, 63, of Ingleby Barwick, Teesside, used a webcam to contact his victims and travelled to the country.

He used charity and business as a cover to meet children as young as 12, Teesside Crown Court heard.

Page was found guilty of four charges of arranging the commission of a child sex offence but cleared of one. He will be sentenced on Thursday.

The former Middlesbrough FC stadium announcer was convicted of two counts of abuse by using a webcam linking his home to the Philippines in 2016 and two more of offences while visiting the country in 2016 and 2019.

The jury heard he tried to haggle down the price for a sexual encounter with a 12-year-old girl and a boy of 13, saying 3,000 pesos - around £44 at the current exchange rate - was too much.

Mark Page was a DJ at Radio 1 in the 1980s and latterly a stadium announcer for Middlesbrough FC

The former presenter, who was on Radio 1 in the 1980s and worked at Middlesbrough's stadium for 20 years, had his phone, tablet and a computer seized in 2020 after Facebook monitors raised concerns.

He claimed his devices had been hacked but did not mention this in police interviews, when he gave "no comment" answers, later explaining to the jury he had been in shock.

Page visited the Philippines regularly for business as managing director of armed forces radio station Garrison FM and used the pseudonym Pancho on a Philippines-based dating app, his trial heard.

In a damning closing statement, prosecutor Jo Kidd asked the jury to remember Jimmy Savile when judging Page's seemingly good character.

She said: "It is worth noting, when one puts on a public face, when one carries out charity work, it does not mean the underbelly of their sexual depravity is not real."