Man admits murder of teenage girl he met on Facebook

A convicted sex offender has admitted the kidnap, rape and murder of a County Durham teenager who he met on a social networking site.

Peter Chapman, who has a history of violent sex assaults, befriended 17-year-old Ashleigh Hall by posing as a teenage boy on Facebook.

In October, after agreeing to meet him, Ashleigh was strangled and dumped in a farmer's field near Sedgefield.

Chapman, 33, pleaded guilty to the charges at Teesside Crown Court.

He also admitted failing to notify police of a change of address, as required by the sex offenders register.

Chapman, who was brought up by his grandparents in Stockton, has a history of sexual offending, it has since emerged.

Since the age of 15, he has been the subject of several sexual assault investigations, and in 1996 was jailed for raping two prostitutes at knifepoint.

The 19-year-old Chapman was sentenced to seven years' imprisonment, and released in 2001.

In October last year, Ashleigh was attracted by a picture of a young, bare-chested man that Chapman - calling himself Peter Cartwright - had posted on the website.

Later that month, she told her mother she was going to stay with a friend. Text messages showed she thought she was being picked up by "Peter Cartwright's" father.

Chapman was arrested after a nationwide alert went out to trace the car he was using.

The registration number had been put into the Automatic Number Plate Recognition System because the convicted sex offender was not complying with his registration requirements.

During initial interviews, he told officers they could "crush his car" and made no mention of Ashleigh, but later he lost his nerve and told stunned detectives about the dead teenager.

He led them to the spot near a lovers' lane where her body was found, almost 24 hours after she left the family home.

Durham Police admit that had he remained silent the car would likely have been crushed and valuable evidence lost.

Det Insp Mick Callan, head of the force's major crime team, said: "The truth is he is a predatory sex offender who, through the tentacles of the internet, could reach out to the young and the vulnerable.

"He knows full well that using his real name and picture would not grab the attention of any young woman for a moment.

"But by using the picture of a good-looking young man as a cover he has woven a web of attraction and deceit that has sadly had a murderous ending."