A young British woman who posed as a teenage boy to deceive potentially dozens of girls into having sexual contact with her was jailed for eight years on Friday. Gemma Watts, 21, created an online persona as Jake Waton, a year-old boy, and used social media to strike up relationships with girls as young as Police described her male alter ego as very believable.
Watts pleaded guilty in November to seven charges relating to four victims aged 14 and 15, although police believe she was a prolific predator and that there were likely to be many other unidentified victims. The charges included assault, sexual assault and meeting a child following sexual grooming.
Watts was sentenced to eight years in prison at Winchester Crown Court in southern England. Her own profile as Jake Waton featured posts about skateboarding and photographs of herself, dressed in baggy sportswear, with her long hair tied up in a bun and hidden under a cap or hood. Having persuaded her victims to meet her, Watts travelled by train to their homes in various parts of England.
The girls believed they were in genuine relationships with a teenage boy. In several cases, there were multiple encounters over a period of months.
She met the parents of some of her victims and had conversations with them. They too were taken in. Phillipa Kenwright, one of the detectives involved in the case, said the victims were unaware they had been deceived until they were contacted by police, and it had been devastating for them to learn the truth.
