A TICEHURST man responsible for encouraging schoolchildren across Tunbridge Wells into sport has been jailed for grooming children for sex.

Paul Willmott, 37, posed as a teenager on social networking sites and encouraged girls as young as 14 to perform sexual acts.

On Wednesday Willmott was jailed for four-and-a-half years and banned from ever working with children again. Judge Philip Statman dubbed him "isolated and sexually inadequate".

Willmott, formerly of Crescent Road in Tunbridge Wells but who most recently lived in The Gables, Ticehurst, was a senior figure with the Tunbridge Wells School Sports Partnership – a Government-funded body which drove sport participation in schools across the borough.

University-educated Willmott was its partnership development manager, a role which included organising inter-school tournaments and visiting schools to present trophies to winning pupils.

The sport partnership, which was disbanded last year, was run by Angley School, a specialist sports college in Cranbrook which also employed Willmott.

Maidstone Crown Court was told none of the girls Willmott targeted was from any school with which he worked.

The net closed on him after the dad of a 15-year-old girl from Colchester, Essex, alerted police when his daughter left her home at night to meet Willmott.

The court was told the girl had been in contact with Willmott for some time and that he had asked for pictures of her naked.

He had also ranged as far afield as Leicester, where he made contact with another 15-year-old girl after claiming he was 17.

He met the girl once and she had performed a sex act on him in a car.

Police seized his computer which revealed further evidence of his depravity, with other young girls – one of them just 14 – exposing themselves or performing sex acts.

He had also wiped more than 300 child porn images from his computer.

Willmott pleaded guilty to 11 offences in total, including two of sexual activity with a child, one of causing a child to be involved in pornography and two of making indecent images of a child.

Defending, Sue Piyadasa said Willmott had felt inadequate, isolated and became a recluse after his second relationship broke up.

She added: "He accepts his behaviour was entirely wrong and doesn't seek to justify it.

"He has had to come to terms with the shame he has brought on his family.

"A spiral of depression is the only explanation for such extreme behaviour."

After the verdict, investigating officer DC Michael Brown of Kent Police said: "Willmott initially presented as a respectable individual with a responsible job.

"However, as the investigation continued it became apparent he led a secret life where he would engage in sexual activity with teenage girls both online and, ultimately, in person."

He praised the bravery of the victims in talking about the crimes.