Dylan Jepson, a 32-year-old from Stoke-on-Trent, has been jailed for 10 years and 11 months after being convicted of raping a woman in Tunstall in February 2022 and sending explicit sex videos to a child via Snapchat. The sentence was handed down at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court on September 17.
Jepson was arrested three times before his eventual conviction. The first arrest followed the rape, when detectives examining his phone discovered "a number" of indecent images of children along with extreme pornographic pictures.
Three arrests before conviction
In October 2024, 32 months after the initial rape, a mother reported to police that she had found sexual messages from a man on her daughter's phone. Jepson was arrested for a second time and interviewed, but was released on bail.
In August last year, Jepson added a girl on Snapchat and repeatedly asked her to send explicit photos of herself. He also sent her videos of him masturbating. This led to his third arrest, after which he was remanded into custody while enquiries continued.
Further victims identified
Further victims were identified from downloads of Jepson's devices. Following a trial, he was found guilty of raping the woman.
At earlier hearings, Jepson admitted nine counts of sexual communication with a child, two counts of causing a child to watch a sex act, three counts of inciting a child to engage in sexual activity and one count of attempted sexual communication with a child.
He also admitted two counts of attempting to cause a child to watch a sex act, one count of sending indecent images to cause alarm, distress or humiliation, two counts of making indecent images of children and one count of possession of extreme pornography.
Lifetime on sex offenders register
In addition to the prison sentence, Jepson was placed on the Sex Offenders Register for life and served with an indefinite Sexual Harm Prevention Order.
Sergeant Emily Raybould of Staffordshire Police said: "Jepson was prolific in his offending and has rightfully been brought to justice for his catalogue of heinous crimes.
"I hope this sentence provides some form of comfort to the victims in these cases, and I hope it demonstrates that we are working tirelessly to act against sex offenders robustly in Staffordshire."
