Barnawartha child sex offender Phillip John Cooper jailed

Judge Justin Hannebery on Wednesday said Phillip John Cooper, 61, had exploited a 13-year-old girl who was hungry and couldn't afford food.

"You used her hunger and her poverty as leverage to get a child to engage in sexual activity with you in exchange for $38," he said.

Cooper was arrested at Melbourne Airport after returning from the Philippines after one of his regular visits on November 7, 2019, and told authorities grooming was prolific in the country.

"It's quite amazing... a girl in the Philippines will do anything for thirty bucks," he said.

He said "you don't groom children in the Philippines, they groom you".

A check of the Barnawartha man's laptop found sexual conversations asking for the ages of girls and for naked photos.

His home was searched the following day with a hard drive and a laptop seized, followed by a search of a storage locker at his Western Australian workplace, with another laptop seized.

A Skype account in his name which was used on multiple devices was checked.

A 24-minute video with an underage Filipino girl was found in which he instructed her to remove her clothes and perform a sex act.

In the video, from March 1, 2019, Cooper said he would be in the country in April and said he wanted to have sex with her.

"How can I make you say yes?" he asked.

During an earlier text conversation on Skype on Boxing Day 2018, Cooper asked a woman "you can show girl".

"My niece will juts (sic) get naked," she replied, and said she was 14 or 15 and had other nieces.

In other conversations between September 19 and November 3, 2019, Cooper said he would meet a girl and bring chocolate.

IN OTHER NEWS:

He asked in another conversation with a different user if he could visit.

Cooper asked another woman with girls aged 11 and 12 if they could undress and send photos, before the mother sent two pornographic images.

Cooper was caught with 173 illegal images and videos on his devices.

Investigations later led to nine children in the Asian country being saved by authorities.

"Activity of this nature is prevalent and hugely damaging to children," Judge Hannebery said.

The victim from the video said she "gets a sick feeling within herself" when she thinks about Cooper and "how Phil destroyed my life".

The 61-year-old was jailed for a maximum of four years and one month and is a registered sex offender for life.

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content: