Mark Page: Ex-Radio 1 DJ's 12-year sentence increased

A selfie Mark Page took in Cebu City was shown in court to disprove his alibi

A former Radio 1 DJ has had his 12-year sentence for child sex offences increased to 18 years in prison.

Mark Page was jailed in March for abusing children both online and in person in the Philippines.

The Attorney General's office subsequently received a request to consider the sentence under the Unduly Lenient Sentence scheme.

Solicitor General Alex Chalk QC said the new term better reflected "the gravity of these very serious crimes".

He said: "Mark Page took advantage of the poverty and deprivation of young, vulnerable children in the Philippines for his own sexual gratification."

Page claimed he had been a victim of hacking but jurors found him guilty of four offences

Page, 63, of Ingleby Barwick, Teesside, used a webcam to contact children aged between 12 and 13 and travelled to the Philippines to sexually abuse them in 2016 and 2019.

He claimed his devices had been hacked but jurors at Teesside Crown Court found him guilty of four offences.

Jailing Page on 10 March, Judge Paul Watson QC said the former broadcaster targeted vulnerable children and was the "very embodiment of depravity".

Page was a DJ at Radio 1 in the 1980s

He said Page, who was on Radio 1 in the 1980s and worked as Middlesbrough FC's stadium announcer for 20 years, "took advantage of the poverty and deprivation" to carry out the abuse.

"You obviously delighted in their humiliation and the satisfaction of your own corrupt sexual desires," the judge told him.

The Court of Appeal has now found Page's original sentence to be unduly lenient and increased it by six years.